According to a global survey, about 33 percent of adults experienced feelings of loneliness worldwide. Brazil had the highest percentage of people experiencing this, with 50 percent of respondents declaring that they felt lonely either often, always, or sometimes. Turkey, India, and Saudi Arabia followed, with 43 percent to 46 percent of respondents having experienced loneliness at least sometimes. On the contrary, the Netherlands, Japan, Germany, and Russia registered the largest share of interviewees which did not feel lonely.

Coping with loneliness during the pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic has suddenly cut off people from all over the world from their social life, and the lack of companionship has been a difficult situation for many to cope with. In the United States, people who experienced lack of company were, unsurprisingly, individuals living alone, and unemployed, disabled, or unemployed people. In relation to mental health, Americans who reported more symptoms of depression were by far more likely to feel lonely.

Impact of mental health According to a survey conducted in 2021 among G7 countries, about seven in 10 people experienced a worsening of their psychological health during the pandemic. A study on clinician-reported changes in selected health behaviors in the United States showed that during the pandemic patients have suffered more from feelings of loneliness, depression or anxiety, and burnout. Also nutrition and other habits have been impacted. The study reported an increase in alcohol consumption, smoking cigarettes, poor nutrition, and use of other substances.

A 2022 survey conducted in 16 countries found that feelings of loneliness tend to decrease with age. That year, nearly 60 percent of young adults between 18 and 24 years reported negative effects on wellbeing from feelings of loneliness, while around 22 percent of respondents aged 65 and older reported the same. This statistic shows the percentage of people worldwide who reported negative effects on wellbeing from feelings of loneliness in 2022, by age group.

Percentage of persons aged 15 years and over by frequency with which they feel lonely, by gender, for Canada, regions and provinces.

The percentage of adults (aged 16 and over) that responded to the question "How often do you feel lonely?" with "Always or often" or "Some of the time"

Rationale At the beginning of 2018, the Prime Minister highlighted the issue of loneliness, announcing a Minister for Loneliness and committing to develop a national strategy to help tackle loneliness and a national measure for loneliness.

The national strategy, A Connected Society: A Strategy for Tackling Loneliness, was published on 15 October 2018. The commitments made by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and NHS England in the strategy identify loneliness to be a serious public health concern.

In keeping with the Loneliness Strategy, loneliness is defined here as: “a subjective, unwelcome feeling of lack or loss of companionship. It happens when we have a mismatch between the quantity and quality of social relationships that we have, and those that we want.” This is based on a definition first suggested by Perlman and Peplau in 1981(1).

Loneliness is a feeling that most people will experience at some point in their lives. When people feel lonely most or all of the time, it can have a serious impact on an individual’s well-being and their ability to function in society. Feeling lonely frequently is linked to early deaths and its health impact is thought to be on a par with other public health priorities like obesity or smoking.

Lonely people are more likely to be readmitted to hospital or have a longer stay. There is also evidence that lonely people are more likely to visit a General Practitioner or Accident and Emergency and more likely to enter local authority funded residential care.

At work, higher loneliness among employees is associated with poorer performance on tasks and in a team, while social interaction at work has been linked to increased productivity.

Loneliness can affect anyone of any age and background. It is important to measure loneliness because the evidence on loneliness is currently much more robust and extensive on loneliness in older people, but much less for other age groups including children and young people.

If more people measure loneliness in the same way, we will build a much better evidence base more quickly. That’s why the Prime Minister asked the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to develop national indicators of loneliness for people of all ages, suitable for use on major studies.

When reporting the prevalence of loneliness, ONS advise using the responses from the direct question, “How often do you feel lonely?” The inclusion of the direct loneliness measure in the Public Health Outcomes Framework (PHOF) will help inform and focus future work on loneliness at both a national and local level, providing a focus to support strategic leadership, policy decisions and service commissioning.

In this first set of data on loneliness prevalence at a local authority level, we have merged the two most frequent categories of feeling lonely (often or always and some of the time). This is due to small sample sizes and the limitations of this data will be explained in more detail in the caveats section.

This will be replaced next year by a 2-year pooled dataset which will have large enough sample sizes to report chronic loneliness. Presenting the data this year will help local authorities to work preventatively to tackle chronic loneliness by showing whether a local area has higher than national average levels of loneliness.

(1) Perlman D and Peplau LA (1981) 'Toward a Social Psychology of Loneliness', in Gilmour R and Duck S (eds.), Personal Relationships. 3, Personal Relationships in Disorder, London: Academic Press, pp. 31–56.

Definition of numerator Weighted number of respondents aged 16 and over, with a valid response to the question "How often do you feel lonely" that answered "Always or often" or "Some of the time". Active Lives Adult Survey data is collected November to November.

Definition of denominator Weighted number of respondents aged 16 and over, with a valid response to the question "How often do you feel lonely?".Denominator values in the Download data are unweighted counts. All analyses for this indicator have been weighted to be representative of the population of England.Active Lives Adult Survey data is collected November to November.

Caveats

Due to the sample size at local authority level, the "often or always" category is merged with the next most severe category of loneliness (people who respond as feeling lonely “some of the time”).

Standard practice is to report the two categories separately. However, data from other sources shows a degree of volatility in the ratio between these categories at the local authority (LA) level.

Therefore, there is a risk that when two local authorities are both reported as having 25% of people feeling lonely (often or always combined with some of the time), the actual figures for "often or always" might differ significantly. For example, one LA might have 24% often and always while another has only 3%, which would not be apparent in the combined category.

This could lead to underestimation or overestimation of chronic loneliness levels by local authorities.

Estimates of loneliness and personal well-being during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic by country, region, county and local and unitary authorities. This dataset also includes outputs from regression models which consider the personal characteristics significantly associated with levels of loneliness and well-being both during and prior to the pandemic affecting the UK.

Among those reporting loneliness and social isolation, 63 percent indicated that they have talked to anyone about their feelings of loneliness, 47 percent of whom have confided in a close friend. This statistic shows the percentage of people feeling lonely or socially isolated who have talked to someone about their feelings in the U.S. in 2018, by confidant.

Percentage of persons aged 15 years and over by frequency with which they feel lonely, by gender and other selected sociodemographic characteristics: age group; immigrant status; visible minority group; Indigenous identity; persons with a disability, difficulty or long-term condition; LGBTQ2+ people; highest certificate, diploma or degree; main activity; and urban and rural areas.

A survey of U.S. adults from December 2021 found that 57 percent of men and 59 percent of women felt lonely. This statistic shows the percentage of adults in the United States who reported feeling lonely as of December 2021, by gender.

A survey from 2021 of over 23,000 people from 28 different countries found that 41 percent stated they felt more lonely in the last six months. Turkey and Brazil were the countries with the highest share of people who said they felt more lonely in the last six months prior to the survey. This statistic shows the percentage of adults worldwide who stated over the last six months they became more or less lonely as of 2021, by country.

In June 2020, more than half of U.S. adults aged 50-80 years felt isolated from others due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In comparison, 27 percent of older adults felt so before the pandemic in October 2018. This statistic portrays the percentage of older adults in the U.S. who reported feeling lonely or isolated before and during the COVID-19 pandemic as of June 2020.

AbstractThis dataset was collected from first-generation immigrants between 2022 and 2023. Over a 28-day period, 39 participants aged 18 to 65, fluent in English and experiencing loneliness (UCLA Loneliness Scale score ≥ 28) contributed to the study. Data collection utilized Samsung Watch Active 2, Oura Ring, AWARE, and Centralive smartphone application. This dataset contains raw data from photoplethysmogram (PPG), inertial measurement unit (IMU) readings, air pressure, and processed data on heart rate, heart rate variability, sleep metrics (bedtime, stages, quality), physical activity (steps, active calories, activity types), and smartphone usage patterns (screen time, notifications, call and message logs). Participants also completed ecological momentary assessments (EMA) and weekly surveys, including instruments like the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), Perceived Stress Scale, Sense of Coherence Scale, Social Connectedness Scale, Twente Engagement with E-Health Technologies questionnaire, and the UCLA Loneliness Scale. This dataset can be used to study the interplay between loneliness, mental well-being, and daily behaviors of immigrants in a real-world context. MethodsDesign and set up This study was designed to create a longitudinal dataset capturing physiological, behavioral, and psychological data from first-generation immigrants living in Finland. The dataset aims to support research on the relationship between mental health and daily lifestyle factors, providing a foundation for further detection algorithm development. To achieve this, the study collected multimodal data over a 28-day period from every participant. Objective data were gathered from wearable devices, which recorded sleep patterns, physical activity, and cardiovascular health metrics and raw PPG signals. Passive smartphone data, such as screen usage, notifications, calls, and messages, were also collected to capture digital behavior patterns. Subjective data were collected through EMAs delivered via push notifications and weekly self-report surveys. These assessments measured daily emotional states—loneliness, stress, depression, and social connectedness. By integrating multiple data sources, this dataset allows researchers to explore the complex interactions between mental health and lifestyle behaviors under free-living conditions. Data collection To facilitate continuous data collection and remote monitoring, the Centralive was used. Centralive is a digital health platform designed for continuous data collection, data storage, real-time monitoring, and remote management of participant engagement throughout the study. Data was collected using different applications, and wearable devices all centralized to the Centralive system. Then the collected data was transferred and stored in the Centralive’s cloud server. The Centralive’s dashboard was used to monitor the collected data to monitor participant’s engagement during data collection. To collect the subjective daily EMAs and weekly surveys, the Centralive prompted the daily EMAs at 8 a.m., 2 p.m., 5 p.m., 8 p.m., and 10 p.m. to every participant. The daily EMA contains questions focusing on their current emotions including feelings of loneliness, social connectedness, and affect. The weekly EMA was open from 12 a.m. to 11:59 p.m. and prompted participants every Sunday. Samsung watch active 2, equipped with Tizen open-source Operating System (TizenOS) was used to collect objective physiological signals. The device recorded photoplethysmography (PPG), accelerometer, and gyroscope data at a sampling rate of 20 Hz, while air pressure measurements were captured at 10 Hz. Data collection was scheduled at two-hour intervals, with each recording session lasting 12 minutes. The Oura Ring was used to track participants' sleep and activity patterns throughout the study. Data collected by the Oura Ring, including sleep, activity metrics, and cardiac metrics including heart rate and heart rate variability sensed during sleep. Centralive utilized Open Authentication to securely access and retrieve these data, making them available to researchers on a daily basis for further analysis. The AWARE framework was used to collect passive phone activity data. The AWARE app ran in the background on participants’ smartphones, continuously logging data without requiring active user input. The collected data included battery usage patterns, recording charging events and power consumption to monitor device usage trends. Call logs were also recorded, tracking incoming and outgoing calls with metadata such as timestamps and call duration, but without capturing conversation content. Similarly, message logs documented sent and received text messages, preserving metadata while ensuring privacy. Notifications data provided insights into participants’ digital engagement by logging received notifications, including app source and timestamps. Screen usage patterns were...

Personal well-being, loneliness and what people in Great Britain felt were important issues; indicators from the Opinions and Lifestyle Survey (OPN).

Between March and June 2020, among U.S. adults aged 50-80 years who got enough sleep just one day a week or less, 55 percent reported feeling a lack of companionship some of the time or often. In comparison, among those who got enough sleep every day or several times a week, while still high, just 38 percent felt a lack of companionship. This statistic depicts the percentage of older adults in the U.S. who reported feeling lonely or isolated during the COVID-19 pandemic from March to June 2020, by amount of sleep.

In a survey conducted at the end of 2024, close to ** percent of respondents in Japan stated that they rarely felt lonely, while over ** percent reported never. The share of individuals never feeling isolated slightly **********compared to the previous year.

BackgroundMethodsResultsDiscussion Data set for Study A in paper ‘‘I’m Trying to Reach Out, I’m Trying to Find My People’’: A Mixed-Methods Investigation of the Link Between Sensory Differences, Loneliness, and Mental Health in Autistic and Nonautistic Adults published in Autism in Adulthood This is a sub-study of "Aligning Dimensions of Interoceptive Experience "ADIE" against anxiety in autistic adults: A superiority randomized controlled trial": https://figshare.com/s/5e713b5a4e37c77923e0 Excel workbook containing demographic and self-report data from a sub-study of the ADIE trial. Glossary with variable descriptions included. Abstract: Rates of loneliness are substantially higher among autistic compared to non-autistic individuals. This observation refutes the persistent stereotype that autistic individuals are not motivated to seek meaningful social relationships. More plausibly, social environments systematically exclude people with higher levels of sensory differences, impeding on opportunities for autistic individuals to form meaningful relationships. Here, we sought to quantify the level of distress associated with loneliness (Study A) and provide complementary qualitative insight into experiences of loneliness in relationship to sensory differences in autistic adults (Study B). In Study A, N=209 participants completed a range of self-report questionnaires. In Study B, nine autistic adults took part in ten-minute, unstructured dyadic conversations around the topic of loneliness. We derived a qualitative understanding of autistic individuals’ experience of loneliness, enriched by inductive and deductive analyses. In Study A, the autistic group showed significantly higher levels of loneliness, loneliness distress, anxiety, depression, and sensory reactivity. We found significant positive correlations between variables, but no group differences in differential relationships. The effect of sensory reactivity on anxiety and depression was mediated by levels of loneliness in both groups. In Study B, autistic participants described the pain of feeling lonely and socially disconnected, while simultaneously experiencing a need for restorative solitude after social overstimulation. Our results indicate that sensory differences are related with higher loneliness and associated poor mental health in both autistic and non-autistic adults. This effect was exacerbated in autistic adults due to higher levels of sensory reactivity. First-hand reports from autistic adults on intense loneliness and the obstructive role of sensory environments refute stereotypes about a lack of social motivation in autistic adults. We conclude that to enable meaningful and inclusive social interaction, a societal effort is needed to create spaces that consider the sensory needs of all neurotypes.

This is a development key figure, see questions and answers on kolada.se for more information. Number of people aged 65 and over who stated “Yes, often” on the question “Does you suffer from loneliness?” divided by all people aged 65 and older in special housing who responded to the survey of older people’s opinion. “Do not know/No opinion” is excluded from the denominator. Data from 2012. Data is available according to gender breakdown.

A survey from 2022 found that around 52 percent of adults in the United States aged 18 to 29 years felt anxious always or often in the past 12 months. This statistic shows the percentage of adults in the United States who stated they always or often felt anxious, depressed, or lonely in the past 12 months as of 2022, by age.

Between March and June 2020, four in ten U.S. adults aged 50-80 years felt a lack of companionship. However, this rate was much higher among women (47 percent) than men (35 percent) and among those who reported more depression symptoms (84 percent) than those with fewer symptoms (36 percent). This statistic illustrates the percentage of older adults in the U.S. who felt a lack of companionship some of the time or often during the COVID-19 pandemic from March to June 2020, by select demographics and characteristics.

Background: Understanding the direction and magnitude of mental health-loneliness associations across time is important to understand how best to prevent and treat mental health and loneliness. This study used weekly data collected over 8 weeks throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to expand previous findings and using dynamic panel models with fixed effects which account for all time-invariant confounding and reverse causation.Methods: Prospective data on a convenience and snowball sample from all 50 US states and the District of Colombia (n = 2,361 with ≥2 responses, 63.8% female; 76% retention rate) were collected weekly via online survey at nine consecutive timepoints (April 3–June 3, 2020). Anxiety and depressive symptoms and loneliness were assessed at each timepoint and participants reported the COVID-19 containment strategies they were following. Dynamic panel models with fixed effects examined bidirectional associations between anxiety and depressive symptoms and loneliness, and associations of COVID-19 containment strategies with these outcomes.Results: Depressive symptoms were associated with small increases in both anxiety symptoms (β = 0.065, 95% CI = 0.022–0.109; p = 0.004) and loneliness (β = 0.019, 0.008–0.030; p = 0.001) at the subsequent timepoint. Anxiety symptoms were associated with a small subsequent increase in loneliness (β = 0.014, 0.003–0.025; p = 0.015) but not depressive symptoms (β = 0.025, −0.020–0.070; p = 0.281). Loneliness was strongly associated with subsequent increases in both depressive (β = 0.309, 0.159–0.459; p < 0.001) and anxiety (β = 0.301, 0.165–0.436; p < 0.001) symptoms. Compared to social distancing, adhering to stay-at-home orders or quarantining were not associated with anxiety and depressive symptoms or loneliness (both p ≥ 0.095).Conclusions: High loneliness may be a key risk factor for the development of future anxiety or depressive symptoms, underscoring the need to combat or prevent loneliness both throughout and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. COVID-19 containment strategies were not associated with mental health, indicating that other factors may explain previous reports of mental health deterioration throughout the pandemic.

Loneliness and well-being in Finnish immigrants: A multimodal dataset from wearables and passive data collection

Overview

The dataset consists of longitudinal physiological, behavioral, and self-reported data collected from first-generation immigrants in Finland during 2022 and 2023. The study included 39 participants aged 18–65, all fluent in English and experiencing loneliness (UCLA Loneliness Scale score ≥28). Data were collected over a 28-day period using multimodal sources, including the Samsung Watch Active 2, Oura Ring, and the AWARE smartphone application.

The dataset includes raw and processed data on cardiovascular health, sleep patterns, physical activity, smartphone usage, and mental health assessments. Daily and weekly ecological momentary assessments (EMA) captured momentary emotional states, while structured surveys administered through Centralive provided insights into participants' mental health and well-being.

Data and File Structure

At the root of the dat...