Are All Tier 1 Colleges the same ?

Yes certainly people here are very competitive. Everybody has grown up being the smartest in the room, now if you put them all in a room together there's bound to be insecurity and rivalry. There's relative grading to make matters worse. But humans by nature are cooperative, hence you will see small groups of 8-10 friends forming which help each other among themselves unconditionally. There are 3-4 people who are both competent and extremely secure and share all notes and materials with the whole batch. The lonely matter is a valid fear, but almost everybody, unless they have sociopathic behaviour, finds their own people just due to the diversity here.