Adolescent loneliness in the United States
Prevalence, sociodemographic correlates, and psychological health over time
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 15743005 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Christopher D Otmar (0000-0001-5433-1612), Christopher Otmar (University of California, San Francisco, corresponding author), Jason M Nagata (0000-0002-6541-0604, University of California, San Francisco) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 34 |
| Pages | 101919-101919 |
| Publication date | 2026-04-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | SSM - Population Health (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2352-8273 • E-ISSN: 2352-8273 |
| Publisher | Elsevier BV (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1016/j.ssmph.2026.101919 |
| PMID | 42005575 |
| OpenAlex | W7148271764 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 84 |
Loneliness is a public health concern, but its epidemiology in U.S. adolescence remains poorly described. Using data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study (analytic N = 6067), we estimated the prevalence of loneliness at approximately age 14 and tested whether sociodemographic characteristics and psychological health were associated with later loneliness. Adolescents self-reported how often they felt lonely ("not lonely," "sometimes," "often"). Caregivers reported adolescents' psychological symptoms (depression, anxiety, attention-deficit/hyperactivity, conduct, oppositional defiant, somatic) annually from baseline through Year 3. We estimated linear mixed-effects growth models to obtain person-specific intercepts (midpoint symptom level) and slopes (rate of change) and then used these trajectories as predictors of loneliness in multilevel ordinal models. Prevalence estimates indicated that 8.9% of adolescents reported being "often lonely," 31.6% "sometimes lonely," and 59.5% "not lonely." In the fully adjusted multilevel model, females had higher odds of loneliness than males (OR = 1.88), and sexual-minority adolescents had higher odds than non-sexual-minority adolescents (OR = 2.81). Higher depressive symptom levels across late childhood and early adolescence were associated with greater odds of loneliness (OR = 1.29), and modest increases in conduct problems were also related to higher loneliness (OR = 1.12). The remaining symptom trajectories showed small or null associations after adjustment. The results from the present study suggest that, despite growing concern about an "epidemic" of loneliness, the experience is unevenly distributed by mid-adolescence, with elevated risk among female adolescents, sexual-minority adolescents, and those with heightened depressive symptoms.
Loneliness · Mental health · Psychological distress · Psychological health · Psychological well-being · Public health · Health disparities and outcomes · Racial and Ethnic Identity Research · Resilience and Mental Health
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Conservation of Resources Theory
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Friendships and Adaptation Across the Life Span
Analysis of Complex Survey Samples
Persons as Contexts
Understanding loneliness during adolescence
The Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study
Rethinking minority stress
Loneliness Across the Life Span
Social isolation
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Adolescent Resilience
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Adolescent social capital
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Extracurricular activity participation, school belonging, and depressed mood
Risk factors for loneliness
Relations of friendship experiences with depressive symptoms and loneliness in childhood and adolescence
LGBTQ individuals’ lived experiences of hypervigilance
Method-ological Mapping of Girlhood Studies
Loneliness Trajectories and Chronic Loneliness Around the World
Feeling socially connected to others is linked to better emotion regulation in adolescent girls' daily lives
The Correlates and Consequences of Friendship Change and Friendlessness During Late Childhood and Early Adolescence
Conceptualising Social Capital in Relation to the Well-Being of Children and Young People
Social Bandwidth
Early relational exclusion and present-day minority stress, social anxiety, and coping responses among sexual minority men
Neighborhood Matters”
Weighted Multilevel Models
Childhood Maltreatment, Bullying Victimization, and Psychological Distress Among Gay and Bisexual Men
The development of loneliness through adolescence and young adulthood
Socioeconomic status and health
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Loneliness and Ethnic Composition of the School Class
Changing the narrative
Social and emotional loneliness
Trajectories of loneliness in later life - Evidence from a 10-year English panel study
Adolescent loneliness and later-life depressive symptoms
The trajectory and determinants of loneliness during the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States
Conservation of Social Resources
Determinants of loneliness during the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States
Sociology of loneliness
Adolescent Loneliness and Health in Early Adulthood
Pay to play? Economic constraints and participation in extracurricular activities
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |