Being a volunteer encountering older people’s loneliness and existential loneliness: alleviating loneliness for others and oneself

Abstract

Background The increasing proportion of older people worldwide is challenging society and the healthcare sector to develop new solutions, such as involving volunteers, especially to combat loneliness among older people. Loneliness is a broad concept comprising, for example existential loneliness – a deep feeling of aloneness in the world. We know little about volunteers’ experience of encountering older people’s loneliness in general and existential loneliness in particular. Such knowledge is important in order to develop high‐quality volunteering. Aim This study aimed to describe volunteers’ experience of becoming and being a volunteer, and encountering older people’s loneliness in general and existential loneliness in particular. Methods This descriptive qualitative study is based on eight focus group interviews and twelve individual interviews with volunteers from different organisations, analysed using conventional content analysis. Findings Being a volunteer meant being a fellow human being, alleviating loneliness for others and oneself. Becoming a volunteer was a way of finding meaning, and volunteering made the volunteers feel rewarded and simultaneously emotionally challenged. Being a volunteer also meant acting on one’s values, challenging boundaries when necessary. Encountering loneliness, including existential loneliness, required sensitivity to others’ needs for both closeness and distance. Conclusion Being a volunteer benefitted not only the older persons the volunteers met, but also the volunteers’ own sense of meaning, by alleviating their own loneliness. Sharing existential thoughts and having meaningful conversations about life and death are challenging, but can contribute to the personal growth of the volunteers themselves. It is important to remember that not all volunteers are confident in having existential conversations, so it is important to pay attention to each volunteer’s prerequisites and needs. In addition, there is a need for support to volunteers’ engagement such as clarifying their role and clarifying the responsibility and expectations from health and social care.

A Conceptual Review of Loneliness in Adults: Qualitative Evidence Synthesis

“…A total of 20 the 155 included studies conceptualised existential loneliness [159][160][161][162][163][164][165][166][167][168][169][170][171][172][173][174][175][176][177][178]. In contrast to emotional or social loneliness, existential loneliness was defined as a feeling of fundamental separateness from others and the wider world, not simply as the absence of meaningful relationships and negative emotional experience.…”

“…In contrast to emotional or social loneliness, existential loneliness was defined as a feeling of fundamental separateness from others and the wider world, not simply as the absence of meaningful relationships and negative emotional experience. Participants described it as a feeling that occurred when important others were absent through some form of psychological rejection or absence [159,161,162], or when people felt left behind by life events, such as death or divorce, and/or experiences of physical or mental decline or limitation through illness, traumatic experience, aging, and a sense of one's mortality [160,[163][164][165][166][167][168][169][170][171][172][173][174][176][177][178]. Similar explanations of existential loneliness were reported by healthcare professionals supporting older people experiencing this type of loneliness [175].…”

Deeply lonely in the borderland between childhood and adulthood - Experiences of existential loneliness as narrated by adolescents

“…However, existential loneliness may be difficult to recognize, since it is not always obvious. In previous studies it has been shown that nursing staff and volunteers found it challenging to recognize and meet older people’s existential loneliness (Sundström et al, 2021 , 2018 ). In addition, health care professionals found it challenging to deal with young adults’ existential concerns, and they needed support to create an inviting atmosphere and stay present, since the conversations could stir up their own existential issues (Lundvall et al, 2019b ).…”

Sensor-based assessment of social isolation incommunity-dwelling older adults: A scopingreview

“…In other research, it is taken as a state in which one needs social contact but does not have the means to acquire it [35]. Meanwhile, some definitions of loneliness claim it as something that "can be measured objectively in terms of the number of friends and social contacts" [36], while others define it as a subjective feeling that occurs when social relationships are deficient in some way [4] quantitatively or qualitatively [37]. Mansfield et al [38] have provided a review of these definitions and concluded that while these concepts of SI and loneliness are distinct concepts, there are many definitions in use that make them often interchangeable, and their phenomena have complex interactions in the human experience.…”