[The dimensions of isolation in the elderly]

For the aged, social isolation and loneliness are among the most frequent causes of hospitalization or placement in homes. A survey of 730 people over 65 shows that cohabitation becomes rarer with advancing age, a phenomenon that has grown increasingly important during the twentieth century. Social isolation, characterized by extremely infrequent contacts with other people, affects approximately one out of ten elderly people. Most at risk are those who retired from lower positions in employment, divorced people and widowers. The main causes are the absence of children and relatives in the immediate area, the fact of being divorced, the lack of professional apprenticeship and, above all, a psychological disposition to introversion. These concepts should form the basis for working out ways of preventing the generalization of a phenomenon which, in the absence of appropriate measures, might become a serious threat to the future of out society.