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Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany

PURPOSE: Our aim was to identify the prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation in the German population during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: Data were taken from a representative survey with n = 3075 individuals (18–70 years; August/September 2021). Valid me...

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Autores principales: Hajek, André, König, Hans-Helmut
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9043881/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35476145
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00127-022-02295-x
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author Hajek, André
König, Hans-Helmut
author_facet Hajek, André
König, Hans-Helmut
author_sort Hajek, André
collection PubMed
description PURPOSE: Our aim was to identify the prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation in the German population during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: Data were taken from a representative survey with n = 3075 individuals (18–70 years; August/September 2021). Valid measures were used to quantify the outcomes (loneliness: De Jong Gierveld scale; perceived social isolation: Bude/Lantermann tool; objective social isolation: Lubben Social Network Scale). Multiple logistic regressions were used to identify the correlates of these three outcomes. RESULTS: The prevalence of loneliness was 83.4%, the prevalence of perceived social isolation was 59.1% and the prevalence of objective social isolation was 28.9%. The prevalence rate significantly differed between the subgroups (e.g., the prevalence of perceived social isolation was 73.9% among individuals aged 18–29 years, whereas it was 48.8% among individuals aged 60–70 years). In regression analysis, several correlates of these outcomes were identified (e.g., marital status, age group (with changing signs), migration background, sports activities, or self-rated health). CONCLUSION: Our study particularly identified very to extraordinarily high prevalence rates for social isolation and loneliness, respectively. Knowledge about the correlates (e.g., age group) may help to address these individuals during the ongoing pandemic. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00127-022-02295-x.
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spelling pubmed-90438812022-04-27 Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany Hajek, André König, Hans-Helmut Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol Original Paper PURPOSE: Our aim was to identify the prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation in the German population during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: Data were taken from a representative survey with n = 3075 individuals (18–70 years; August/September 2021). Valid measures were used to quantify the outcomes (loneliness: De Jong Gierveld scale; perceived social isolation: Bude/Lantermann tool; objective social isolation: Lubben Social Network Scale). Multiple logistic regressions were used to identify the correlates of these three outcomes. RESULTS: The prevalence of loneliness was 83.4%, the prevalence of perceived social isolation was 59.1% and the prevalence of objective social isolation was 28.9%. The prevalence rate significantly differed between the subgroups (e.g., the prevalence of perceived social isolation was 73.9% among individuals aged 18–29 years, whereas it was 48.8% among individuals aged 60–70 years). In regression analysis, several correlates of these outcomes were identified (e.g., marital status, age group (with changing signs), migration background, sports activities, or self-rated health). CONCLUSION: Our study particularly identified very to extraordinarily high prevalence rates for social isolation and loneliness, respectively. Knowledge about the correlates (e.g., age group) may help to address these individuals during the ongoing pandemic. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00127-022-02295-x. Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2022-04-27 2022 /pmc/articles/PMC9043881/ /pubmed/35476145 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00127-022-02295-x Text en © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visithttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) .
spellingShingle Original Paper
Hajek, André
König, Hans-Helmut
Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany
title Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany
title_full Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany
title_fullStr Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany
title_full_unstemmed Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany
title_short Prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence from a representative survey in Germany
title_sort prevalence and correlates of loneliness, perceived and objective social isolation during the covid-19 pandemic. evidence from a representative survey in germany
topic Original Paper
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9043881/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35476145
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00127-022-02295-x
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