Loneliness and the UCLA scale: what eight questions measure

Someone with a full calendar, colleagues all day and a busy group chat can still feel that nobody really knows them. Someone else sees two friends a month and feels fine. Counting contacts tells you little about loneliness, which is why psychologists measure it by asking how people feel.

Our UCLA Loneliness Scale test does that in eight questions. It is an educational tool and not a diagnosis.

Loneliness is a gap

In 1982 Letitia Anne Peplau and Daniel Perlman described loneliness as the unpleasant feeling that comes when your social relationships fall short of what you want, in number or in closeness. The definition explains the two people above. Loneliness depends on the distance between the contact you have and the contact you need, and that need differs from person to person.

It also differs from social isolation, which is the objective state of having few contacts. The two often overlap, but not always. You can be isolated and not lonely, or surrounded by people and lonely.

Where the questions come from

The UCLA Loneliness Scale was first published in 1978 by Daniel Russell and colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles. It was revised in 1980, and Russell published a third version in 1996. The full version has 20 questions. In 2004 Mary Elizabeth Hughes, Linda Waite, Louise Hawkley and John Cacioppo published a three-question short form for large surveys.

Our version has eight questions. Three of them are the three Hughes questions: "How often do you feel that you lack companionship?", "How often do you feel left out?" and "How often do you feel isolated from others?" The other five are close to questions from Russell's longer scale, with some changes in wording. Three ask about the opposite of loneliness, for example "How often do you feel part of a group of friends?", and they are scored in reverse.

You answer each question on a five-point scale from never to nearly always, and all answers add up to one loneliness score. The published versions use three or four answer options, so your number cannot be compared directly with published norms.

Why loneliness deserves attention

In 2010 Julianne Holt-Lunstad, Timothy Smith and Bradley Layton pooled 148 studies and found that people with stronger social relationships were more likely to survive the follow-up period than people with weaker ones. Later work by Holt-Lunstad and colleagues pointed in the same direction for loneliness and isolation.

John Cacioppo and Louise Hawkley described in 2009 how loneliness can make people more watchful for rejection. Contact then feels riskier, people withdraw a little, and the loneliness can keep itself going. Seen this way, loneliness is a signal that a need is not being met, much like hunger, and nothing to be ashamed of.

What to do with a high score

A high score means you often feel left out, without close people, or unknown. It says nothing about why, and it is not a diagnosis of any condition. Loneliness often follows a change, such as a move, a new job, a breakup, a loss or becoming a parent, and it can ease as life settles.

Talk to a doctor or psychologist if loneliness has lasted for months, if it comes with low mood, loss of interest, trouble sleeping or a sense of hopelessness, or if you have thoughts of harming yourself. In those cases a screening such as the PHQ-9 depression test can be a first step, but a conversation with a professional matters more than any score.

If fear of other people's judgement keeps you from contact, the social anxiety test may show whether that plays a part. And if you are wondering which of your relationships give you real support, read the post on how to recognise a true friendship.