I'm an expat myself so I'm curious about this.. Were their visas tied to their work contract? Did they have their families living with them?

As an anecdote, when I first moved abroad I was single and didn't speak the local language (Dutch) so I didn't really have any incentive to interact socially outside of work and I ended up spending way too many hours in the office but just about managing to do my job competently because I was pretty sad and demotivated all the time and often doubted my decision to move abroad.