More Americans eating alone

Washington Post - A 1999 survey found that the number of people who ate alone at least part of time tripled between the 1960s and 1990s. By 2006, nearly 60 percent of Americans regularly ate on their own, according to the American Time Use Survey. And today that number is even higher.

Breakfast has undergone the most significant transformation. Roughly 53 percent of all breakfasts are now eaten alone, whether at home, in the car, or at one's desk, according to the latest report.

Lunch meanwhile is nearly as lonely these days. Some 45 percent of midday meals are had alone, according to the report.

Dinner is the only meal that is still largely communal. Roughly three quarters of all supper's are still eaten with others today. But even that is changing.

"Every meal is becoming a more solitary affair, even dinner" said Seifer. "People are eating alone at home and out."

One of the clearest reasons for the shift is something that has been happening to American households, gradually, for decades: they have been getting smaller. Over the more than 30-year span between 1970 and 2012, the percentage of households that contained a single person grew from 17 percent to 27 percent, according to Census Bureau data.

"Only 13 percent of households had one person in them in the 1960s," said Seifer, who credits marriage and family trends with the rise of the single person American household. "People are either delaying marriage or putting off the formation of families after they get married more and more these days."