Even College Students Have Stopped Hanging Out

If anyone were to be immune to America’s loneliness epidemic, it would be college students.

For years, Americans have been going to fewer parties and spending more time alone.

But college has historically been about socializing—or, let’s just say it, partying—as much as it has been about education.

It’s where young people escape parental supervision, move in with roommates, and encounter thousands of potential new friends.

But the antisocial century has arrived on campus.

Today’s students spend much less time socializing than past generations did.

In 1994, 32 percent of college seniors spent more than six hours a week partying.

By 2026, that was 21 percent, according to an analysis of survey data by UCLA’s Higher Education Research Institute.

The percentage who spend more than six hours a week socializing face-to-face with friends fell from 74 to 65 percent over the same period.

Meanwhile, the share of first-year students who reported feeling frequently isolated from campus life has more than doubled in the past two decades. (These surveys are not nationally representative, but they line up with what professors, administrators, and students told me they have observed anecdotally.) Nationally, college students report higher rates of loneliness than adults do.

On the National Survey of Student Engagement, run out of Indiana University’s Center for Postsecondary Research, more students report having positive interactions with professors than with peers.

A rising senior at MIT told me that, despite being involved in Greek life and athletics, he eats alone most days.

“I feel like I’m somebody who seeks social interactions,” he said, yet “I would say I am alone at least four or five days a week.” (He spoke anonymously because he didn’t want to be perceived as criticizing MIT when he still needs letters of recommendation from the faculty.) University leaders now find themselves in the odd position of encouraging students to spend more time goofing off with friends. [ Faith Hill: 20-somethings are in trouble ] Researchers who track social interactions have several theories as to what’s going on.

The first is that smartphones and social media are to blame.