Distress, loneliness, and mental health during the COVID‐19 pandemic: Test of the extension of the Evolutionary Theory of Loneliness

COVID‐19 restrictions such as lockdowns or quarantines may increase the risk for social isolation and perceived loneliness. The mechanisms can be modeled by Cacioppo's Evolutionary Theory of Loneliness (ETL), which predicts that a lack of perceived social connectedness may lead, in the long‐term, to mental and physical health consequences. However, the association between COVID‐19 pandemic distress, mental health, and loneliness is not sufficiently understood. The present longitudinal study examined the relationship between distress and depression, and the mediating effects of anxiety and loneliness in a German rehabilitation sample (N = 403) at two timepoints (≤6 weeks pre‐rehabilitation; ≥12 weeks post‐rehabilitation; mean time between T1 and T2 was 52 days). Change scores between T1 and T2 were examined for the variables COVID‐19 Peritraumatic Distress Index (CPDI), anxiety, loneliness, and depression. The results of the serial mediation analysis indicated that anxiety and loneliness were able to explain the relationship between distress and depression with 42% of variance in depression accounted for. Findings extend research on the relationship between COVID‐19 and mental health by considering anxiety and loneliness as sustaining factors of depressive symptoms, thus, successfully applying the ETL. Results stress the necessity to consider anxiety and loneliness in the treatment or prevention of depression.