Intuitively, this makes perfect sense.

Non-lonely people interact with one another, continuously exposing themselves to each others views and opinions (even if indirectly).

A lonely person won't be part of this echo chamber, so their opinions will usually be self-formed and less influenced by the collective opinion of others.

It's easy to see how this creates a feedback loop. A lonely person doesn't share as many worldviews with non-lonely people, so has a harder time fitting in, which makes breaking the cycle even harder.

Is it just me, or does it feel like a significant proportion of psychological research nowadays comes to "no-brainer' conclusions? I find myself more often looking at an article and thinking, "Well, duh."

This is a genuine question. It may just be an environmental shift. Since I used to be deep in the field, I had access to any scientific journal I could think of and the latest research studies. Now I'm mainly seeing pop culture psychology. Has it always been this way?