Lonelines in pre-through late adolescence: Exploring the contributions of a multidimensional approach

A multidimensional loneliness measure was administered to 444 subjects in the 11-17 age range. The four-scale instrument probes for loneliness in relationships with parents and peers, and for aversion to and affinity for aloneness. All subscales were shown to exhibit high reliability and excellent factorial validity. With regard to age effects, a marginally significant increase was found for parent-related loneliness, accompanied by a sudden drop at the seventh-grade level. A decreasing age trend emerged in both peer-related loneliness and aversion to aloneness. A set of variables pertaining to subjects' social integration (number of friends, quality of friendships) and psychological functioning (outlook on the future) accounted for a sizable portion of the variance in all four scales, particularly in peer-related loneliness. Implications of these findings are discussed and suggestions for future research are outlined.