Who Feels Lonely in the European Union?

Abstract

This chapter analyses the prevalence of loneliness in the European Union along several dimensions, exploring vulnerabilities within specific demographic groups and mitigating or triggering factors such as meaningful social connections and life events. The first part of the chapter investigates which demographic and socio-economic groups are more vulnerable to loneliness. In particular, it considers characteristics such as age, gender, socio-economic status, sexual orientation, disability, migration background and population density of the place of residence. The second part of the chapter is devoted to shedding light on the relationship between loneliness and social connectedness. Regression analysis is used to investigate how the risk of feeling lonely is associated with a rich set of variables related to respondents’ social interactions and relationships. Finally, the chapter looks into life events that might trigger loneliness. Major life transitions, such as retirement or leaving the education system, may bring disruptions to people’s social networks and thus increase the risk of feeling lonely.