College Freshmen Are Lonelier and More Innocent Than Ever

College campuses may have a reputation for rampant debauchery, but increasingly the students showing up at orientation just look like lonely homebodies. College freshmen report spending less time hanging out with their friends than they have in the past three decades, a new study shows.

Only 18 percent of freshmen surveyed in 2014 said they spent at least 16 hours a week socializing with peers, according to a report released Thursday by researchers at UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute (PDF). That's the lowest level since researchers began polling this group in 1987. At the same time, more freshmen are spending just a handful of hours with friends every week. Almost 39 percent of freshmen said they spent five hours or less a week with buddies—an all-time high. For the annual report, researchers surveyed 153,015 freshmen at 227 four-year U.S. colleges in fall 2014, administering their questions during orientation or at the beginning of classes.