I encountered validation for my New Year’s resolution (see one blog before this) — to renew or keep up connections with former co-workers and friends I met through work — from an unlikely source:  “Scientific American.”  The bold headline in a July 28, 2010 article, which was carried by another blog on “dailygood.org,” announces, “Social Ties Boost Survival by 50%.”

The opening sentence reads, “A meta-study covering more than 300,000 participants across all ages reveals that adults get a 50 percent boost in longevity if they have a solid social network.”  Unlike a lot of health-related research we read, which one month makes the claim that eating some food products may prevent diabetes, cancer and heart disease and we find two months later that these weren’t quite as effective as someone thought and that we really should be eating something else even more miraculous, this study is “based on more than 100 years of research.”  And surely 100 years of study showing “that having a healthy social life is incredibly important to staying physically healthy” can’t be wrong.