Technology is reducing the global population’s need to connect with each other, creating a culture of loneliness, according to Mia Kyricos – chief brand officer at Spafinder Wellness Inc. In an exclusive Thought Leader column for Spa Opportunities, Kyricos reveals how the wellness industry can play a part in reconnecting people.

Can Spa & Wellness Properties Help to Fight Loneliness?

Globally, more people live alone than at any other time in history, with single-person households increasing 50 per cent in the last 15 years and forecast to skyrocket to 60 per cent in 30 years. Add to that the proliferation of technology – where we spend more time, on average, in front of our various screens than we do sleeping – and we have nearly succeeded in removing our need to actually talk to one another.

Is this progression or regression?

Progression says we are living in a hyper-social world, where thanks to those screens, we can stay connected to each other and share everything. Regression says we’re entering a great “age of loneliness,” particularly in the developing world, with India, China and Brazil’s single populations growing the fastest worldwide – meaning less and less opportunity to interact with one another in person.

Why should we care?

For those of us in the business of wellness, we regularly attempt to foster a culture of wellbeing in the lives of our clients.

Is this an opportunity or hurdle?

Opportunity says we can accept that wellbeing is personal, and target our products and services to consumers on a 1:1 basis. ‘Hurdle’ says that we have a better chance of impacting more people if we could just get them to all connect with one another.

The question is, how?

Spa and wellness properties, particularly those situated in our own backyards, truly have an opportunity to become the new, ‘third place’. Just like the ‘Starbucks phenomenon’, where the local coffee shop became a favored destination between the office and homestead, so too can spas, yoga studios and wellness centres. We are seeing this ‘hyper-social’ behaviour already with popular fitness brands including CrossFit and others like SoulCycle in the US, bringing together classes of individuals to sweat-it-out together on stationary bikes. Somehow, these brands have found a way to foster a culture of community along with wellbeing (or at least an aspect of it), resulting in clients that not only work out together, but even vacation together.

So, since I’m a glass-half-full kind of girl, I say we have progressed and technology presents us with an opportunity to connect, both online and offline, and foster a culture of wellbeing in today’s screen-driven world.

Fortunately, I still have not found a computer to give me a great massage, but I’m more than happy to meet a friend for tea and a 60-minute deep tissue the next time I am able.

Sources:
1 Swedish economist Dr. Kjell Nordstrom’s data shared at the 2014 Global Spa & Wellness Summit

2 The New York Times, “One’s a Crowd,” February 2012.

3 See Spafinder Wellness 365’s top 2015 trend, “My Fitness. My Tribe. My Life.”