The article highlights negative consequences of loneliness for mental and physical health, and notes the many different contributing factors that can lead to loneliness. The authors explore ways that gratitude and “psychological flexibility and engaged living” may prevent or mitigate loneliness. They explored the empirical relations between gratitude and engaged living in a population of older (40 years +) in The Netherlands using questionnaire attitude scales.
Key points
- Psychological flexibility is defined as “the ability to flexibly cope with adversity, thereby promoting engagement in personal meaningful or valued activities”.
- Psychological flexibility decreases with age, and this lack may hinder people from engaging in activities that may prevent loneliness.
- Engaged living means being actively involved in activities that you find meaning in, such as hobbies, exercise, volunteering, faith-based activities, rewarding career activities, and social relationships.
- In their sample, men were less grateful than women (!).
- People who were more grateful were less lonely and more engaged in living.
- More highly educated people scored higher in psychological flexibility and lower in loneliness.
- As in other studies, the older participants reported more loneliness.
- Interestingly, the statistical analysis revealed that gratitude accounted for the protective effect of engaged living on loneliness. In other words, engaged living by itself is not enough to prevent loneliness.
- The findings indicate that the combination of gratitude and psychological flexibility were most important for avoiding loneliness. This suggests that “Grateful individuals may have learned to accept that life can be good but also that life knows times of suffering, and they understand situations, their own identity and other people”.