Loneliness

MODELS AND MEASUREMENT OF LONELINESS

PERSONALITY, DEVELOPMENT, AND CONTEXT

LONELINESS, HEALTH, AND COPING

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Social scientists agree that loneliness stems from the subjective experience of deficiencies in social relationships and that these deficiencies are unpleasant, aversive, and exceptionally common. Objectively deficient social relationships (i.e., social isolation) do not necessarily correspond with feeling lonely. Thus, it is common to appear alone but not feel lonely, and to feel lonely within a seemingly rich social relationship network. This potential paradox highlights an important distinction between quantitative and qualitative aspects of social relationships.

MODELS AND MEASUREMENT OF LONELINESS

Theoretical perspectives on loneliness differ concerning the nature of loneliness, whether loneliness stems from internal or situational causes, and where such causes occur developmentally. Psychoanalysts view loneliness as a pathological result of internal factors rooted in childhood. Sociologists view loneliness as a normative event stemming from societal influences that occur throughout development. From cognitive perspectives, loneliness occurs when people perceive discrepancies between their desired and actual patterns of relationships, with desired patterns stemming from previous relationships and comparisons of one’s own relationships to those of similar others (i.e., social comparison). Although different perspectives contribute uniquely to our understanding, the cognitive perspective serves as the dominant model for studying loneliness.

The measurement of loneliness depends inherently on theoretical conceptualizations of the construct. Unidimensional views of loneliness posit a common core of experience that varies in intensity regardless of the antecedents or causes of feeling lonely. Many unidimensional scales exist, but the UCLA Loneliness Scale is the most commonly used. This measure assesses loneliness via self-report without using the terms lonely or loneliness, thereby reducing social desirability influences. Extensive psychometric work indicates that it is a reliable and valid measure of loneliness.

Multidimensional measures involve assessments of perceived quality and quantity of social interaction across multiple domains such as romantic, friendship, family, and community relationships. Multidimensional views of loneliness have become more common in the research literature, spurring intensive psychometric work on these types of scales. Two multidimensional views of loneliness have received considerable research attention. The first breaks down loneliness into distinct components that reflect stable enduring traits or transitory states tied strongly to situation/context. Studies examining these components using specialized scales typically yield test-retest correlations that are higher (indicating greater stability) for measures assessing trait loneliness than for measures assessing state loneliness, suggesting that this distinction is valid. A second multidimensional view involves a distinction between social loneliness that results from a lack of relationships that provide a sense of belonging (e.g., friendships) and emotional loneliness that occurs when people lack relationships that foster deep connection or feelings of attachment (e.g., romantic relationships). Many scales designed to measure social and emotional loneliness exist, and research findings suggest that this distinction is also a valid one.

PERSONALITY, DEVELOPMENT, AND CONTEXT

Studies examining associations between personality characteristics and loneliness consistently show that extroverted people report less loneliness, whereas highly neurotic people often feel lonely. Low self-esteem, shyness, and pessimism also correspond to higher levels of loneliness. It remains unclear whether these personality traits lead to loneliness by limiting social contact and preventing the formation and maintenance of quality relationships, whether feeling lonely biases self-assessment of personality, or whether personality predisposes one to develop few relationships, and the subsequent lack of relationships reciprocally influences one’s personality. There remains a need for continued research that delineates causal paths among personality characteristics and loneliness.

Most children understand that being alone does not necessarily mean one is lonely, and that people can feel lonely when they do not appear to be alone. Adolescents experience more loneliness than do other individuals due to necessary restructuring of social groups to include friendships and other social relationships outside of the family during transitions to elementary, junior high, and high school. Family environments also influence the development of relationships in that children surrounded by parental conflict exhibit social anxiety and avoidance that contribute to loneliness.

Young adults face many contextual events, such as moving out of the home or going away to college, that require the development of new social ties. During these transitions, interpersonal difficulties may hinder the development of new social relationships, leaving one feeling lonely. Shy people who maintained a few high-quality relationships during high school may suddenly feel very lonely away at college when their shyness interferes with opportunities to make new friends. Although these types of life transitions often foster feelings of temporary loneliness that subside over time for most people, some individuals remain chronically lonely, suggesting that interpersonal difficulties or personality characteristics contribute to feelings of loneliness across the life span.

During adulthood, contextual transitions including college graduations and the establishment of careers present challenges to existing social networks and the need to form new relationships. New obstacles include individualistic or competitive work environments that make the formation and maintenance of satisfying relationships difficult. As adults, people place less emphasis on friendships than on intimate or romantic relationships. Although intimate relationships provide protection from loneliness, relationship quality is vital as adults in strained or unsatisfying relationships often report feeling lonely.

Elderly individuals face a number of challenges to maintaining their social networks, including the loss of relationships with coworkers through retirement, reduced contact with adult children, and the deaths of spouses or friends. Decreased functional mobility, cognitive impairment, and physical illness strain existing relationships and impede the establishment of new relationships. Despite these challenges, the elderly are less lonely on average than are college students, and increases in loneliness occur only among individuals eighty years and older. Married men and women report less loneliness than do elderly widows and widowers and men and women who are divorced or never married. Spouses in elderly couples provide functional support in addition to companionship and emotional connection, suggesting multiple ways in which marriage serves to protect against feelings of loneliness. For those without spouses, friendships with similar others provide more protection against loneliness than do relationships with adult children and neighbors.

LONELINESS, HEALTH, AND COPING

Consistent links between loneliness, life satisfaction, and anxiety exist, and loneliness is associated with depression independently of age, gender, physical health, cognitive impairment, network size, and social activity involvement.

In addition, loneliness influences well-being and feelings of hopelessness independently of associations with social isolation and perceived social support. Loneliness also relates to physical health, as evidenced by its consistent associations with alcohol abuse, admission of the elderly to nursing homes, suicide, and mortality.

Although loneliness uniquely influences physical health, potential causes for these connections have received varying degrees of support. One view posits that loneliness affects health through maladaptive behaviors including smoking, drinking, poor exercise habits, and substandard dietary practices; however, lonely and nonlonely people rarely differ in the frequency of such behaviors. Alternative models argue that loneliness influences physical reactions to stress including cardiovascular activation, cortisol production, immunocompetence deficiencies, and sleep disruptions that link directly to development of cardiovascular disease, susceptibility to disease and infection, and diminished restorative processes that maintain overall resilience. Emerging findings provide initial support for these links, suggesting promising avenues for future research.

Strategies for coping with loneliness include changing actual relationships, expectations about relationships, or reducing the importance of relationships. Attempts to change one’s social relationships are active coping strategies wherein feelings of loneliness motivate people to form new relationship ties. Changing expectations about social relationships involves cognitive restructuring of how people view the social relationships of others. Attempts to reduce the importance of social relationships or engage in diversionary activities are passive coping strategies that often do little to alleviate loneliness.

Researchers have begun to explore the success of intervention programs in reducing feelings of loneliness, and promising findings have emerged. Social skills training for children and young adults provide the tools needed to effectively initiate, develop, and maintain satisfying social relationships. College orientation, mentoring, and buddy-pairing programs provide social contact with similar others in hopes of fostering relationship development during a transitional period when loneliness is quite common. Finally, interventions that effectively reduce loneliness among older adults target specific groups (e.g., divorcées or widows) and provide social contact opportunities with similar others as well as information that is useful for maintaining established social relationships.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Brashears, Matthew E., Miller McPherson, and Lynn Smith-Lovin. 2006. Social Isolation in America: Changes in Core Discussion Networks over Two Decades. American Sociological Review 71 (June): 353–375.

Peplau, Leticia A., and Daniel Perlman, eds. 1982. Loneliness: A Sourcebook of Current Theory, Research, and Therapy. New York: Wiley-Interscience.

Russell, Daniel W. 1996. The UCLA Loneliness Scale (Version 3): Reliability, Validity, and Factor Structure. Journal of Personality Assessment 66 (1): 20–40.

Russell, Daniel W., Carolyn E. Cutrona, Arlene de la Mora, and Robert B. Wallace. 1997. Loneliness and Nursing Home Admission among Rural Older Adults. Psychology and Aging 12 (4): 574–589.

Steptoe, Andrew, Natalie Owen, Sabine R. Kunz-Ebrecht, and Lena Brydon. 2004. Loneliness and Neuroendocrine, Cardiovascular, and Inflammatory Stress Responses in Middle-Aged Men and Women. Psychoneuroendocrinology 29: 593–611.

Weiss, Robert S. 1973. Loneliness: The Experience of Emotional and Social Isolation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

W. Todd Abraham

Daniel W. Russell