The trajectory and determinants of loneliness during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States

Abstract

In March of 2020, state governments in the United States began implementing stay-at-home orders in an attempt to curtail the spread of COVID-19. As a result, most people experienced a decrease in face-to-face interactions as they limited their participation in social gatherings, travel, and in-person work. Although these orders aimed to stop the spread of COVID-19, a potential unintended consequence of these guidelines was an increase in loneliness, which has several negative mental and physical health consequences. The goals of the present study were to investigate the extent that one’s romantic relationship status and living arrangements affected self-reports of loneliness and to track how self-reports of loneliness changed over the span of 1 month following the first stay-at-home orders in the United States. Participants ( N = 311) reported their loneliness at three time points in 2-week intervals. Results showed considerable overlap between living arrangements and romantic relationship status in predicting loneliness; however, it appears that living with another person has a greater protective effect against loneliness compared to relationship status. That is, whereas living with others or being in a romantic relationship both predicted lower loneliness scores, one’s living arrangements accounted for variance in loneliness scores beyond what was accounted for by one’s relationship status. The researcher also explored whether loneliness increased across three time points throughout data collection. Results showed that loneliness levels remained approximately the same across time. An unhypothesized interaction effect did emerge between time and age. Subsequent probing of this interact effects showed that young adults experienced the greatest level of loneliness but this loneliness decreased over the month, whereas older adults experienced less loneliness but experienced a small increase in loneliness over the during this time. Together, these results suggest that certain groups of people were more likely to experience loneliness during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Adolescents' longitudinal trajectories of mental health and loneliness: The impact of COVID‐19 school closures

“…COVID‐19‐related school closures and stay‐at‐home orders may therefore have increased risk of feelings of loneliness in young people (Bu et al, 2020 ; Magson et al, 2021 ). Studies conducted with adults (age range 18–88 years) have shown that COVID‐19 either led to increased feelings of loneliness (for a review, see Buecker & Horstman, 2021 ) or had no effect on feelings of loneliness (Bu et al, 2020 ; Luchetti et al, 2020 ; Ray, 2021 ). According to Buecker and Horstmann ( 2021 ), the evidence about pandemic containment measures being associated with changes in perceived quality or quantity of social relationships, or both, is inconclusive because studies have not examined these processes.…”

Relationship Status-Based Health Disparities during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…During the pandemic, public health officials cautioned against extra-familial social interactions, even warning against extended family gatherings, and public communal spaces such as bars and churches, which may have held special importance for non-married adults as primary spots for socializing, were shut down around the US ( Thomeer et al 2020 ). The social conditions around the pandemic increased social isolation and loneliness within society ( Ray 2021 ; van Mulukom et al 2020 ), perhaps especially for the non-married, and consequently may have increased health disparities by relationship status.…”

Alone-Time and Loneliness in the Academia

“…A similar search using keywords 'teacher loneliness' returns a few dedicated results (predominantly associated with pandemic lockdowns) (Jandrić et al 2020(Jandrić et al , 2021. 'Researcher loneliness' seems to offer the most relevant results (see Gannon-Leary et al 2011), yet most of these results are (again) associated with pandemic lockdowns (Ray 2021) and/or focused on early career researchers such as PhD students (Cantor 2019). Looking at (more) senior academic levels, scholarly research on loneliness is few and far in between.…”