I think, therefore I am: The contributions of threat interpretations in generating and managing youth loneliness

我思故我在：威胁解释对产生和管理青少年孤独感的贡献

• 批准号: ES/T00004X/1
• 负责人: Jennifer Lau
• 金额: $ 52.34万
• 依托单位: King's College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2020 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=ES%2FT00004X%2F1
• 关键词: think; therefore; am; contributions; threat

Loneliness is a negative emotion that occurs when one perceives his/her social relationships and networks to fall short of his/her social needs. Because loneliness is thought to have evolved as a powerful motivator to connect with others and solicit their support, it may arise during periods of life that are characterised by social turbulence. One such period is youth, where there are major changes in the external social environment such as the amount of time spent with peers and in the emergence of new peer hierarchies and cliques - but also in internal factors, such as the need for peer approval and the aversiveness of peer rejection. Accordingly, as these social changes may bring about instability in social relationships, loneliness can arise to facilitate re-connection with others, and therefore be considered a normal part of growing up for many young people. However for some young people loneliness can be intense, upsetting and persistent, predicting poorer mental and physical health. Delivering interventions to manage loneliness in youth is therefore crucial, made more so as this may reflect a period of plasticity for learning more effective ways of regulating emotions. As some negative thinking styles such as a tendency to endorse threatening over benign expectations and explanations of ambiguous social situations is associated with youth loneliness, measuring and targeting these earlier in life may be a powerful 'vaccine' for reducing the risk of loneliness.However before any early interventions programs are planned around the targeting of threat interpretations, there are some key questions that need to addressed. First there is only one study showing that threat interpretations precede and predict risk for loneliness rather than reflect consequences. Disentangling these roles may inform whether it is useful to modify threat interpretations in order to alter loneliness. In addition it is not clear whether threat interpretations affect loneliness by influencing social withdrawal behaviour, as theories would suggest. Second all studies investigating threat interpretations in relation to loneliness have used questionnaires about hypothetical social scenarios rather than directly assess thoughts to real-life events. Establishing the relationship between threat interpretations and loneliness in everyday life is important, again for informing whether it is helpful to modify these thinking styles to alter lonely feelings. Finally, although methods have been developed for challenging threat interpretations related to other social behavioural problems like social anxiety, it is not clear if these methods are as relevant to and well tolerated by young people who are lonely.The goals of this research are to address these questions. Three studies will be performed. First a longitudinal study of around 1000 young people will be conducted to examine the cross-time relationships between threat interpretations, social withdrawal and loneliness with a nested interview study supplementing quantitative data. Second an ecological momentary assessment study that assesses threat interpretations to real social situations and loneliness at several times in the day for a week will be conducted to investigate these relationships in daily life. Finally, together with some young people we will develop some materials for a training program that aims to modify threat interpretations. These will then be presented to another group of young people to assess for relevance, acceptability and how helpful and feasible such an intervention is. Potential effectiveness at reducing loneliness and threat interpretations, and changing social behaviour will be considered.These studies will generate data to support further investigation into cognitive interventions for youthloneliness and contribute to the national dialogue on loneliness between professionals/practitioners working with youth, policymakers, the public and young people themselves.

孤独是一种负面情绪，当一个人认为他/她的社会关系和网络不能满足他/她的社会需求时就会发生。因为孤独被认为是一种与他人联系并寻求他们支持的强大动力，所以它可能出现在社会动荡的生活时期。其中一个时期是青年时期，在这一时期，外部社会环境发生了重大变化，如与同龄人相处的时间增加，出现了新的同龄人等级制度和小集团，但内部因素也发生了重大变化，如需要同龄人的认可和不愿被同龄人拒绝。因此，由于这些社会变化可能会带来社会关系的不稳定，孤独感可能会出现，以促进与他人的重新联系，因此被认为是许多年轻人成长的正常部分。然而，对于一些年轻人来说，孤独感可能是强烈的，令人沮丧和持久的，预示着更差的身心健康。因此，提供干预措施来管理青少年的孤独感是至关重要的，因为这可能反映了学习更有效的情绪调节方法的可塑性时期。由于一些消极的思维方式，如倾向于支持威胁而不是良性的期望和对模糊的社会情况的解释与青少年孤独有关，在生命的早期测量和针对这些可能是降低孤独风险的强大“疫苗”。然而，在围绕威胁解释的目标制定任何早期干预计划之前，有一些关键问题需要解决。首先，只有一项研究表明，威胁解释先于并预测孤独的风险，而不是反映后果。解开这些角色可能会告知它是否是有用的修改威胁的解释，以改变孤独。此外，目前尚不清楚是否威胁的解释影响孤独通过影响社会退缩行为，理论将建议。第二，所有调查与孤独有关的威胁解释的研究都使用了关于假设社会场景的问卷调查，而不是直接评估对现实生活事件的想法。在日常生活中建立威胁解释和孤独感之间的关系是很重要的，这也是为了说明修改这些思维方式是否有助于改变孤独感。最后，虽然已经开发了一些方法来挑战与其他社会行为问题（如社交焦虑）相关的威胁解释，但尚不清楚这些方法是否与孤独的年轻人相关并能被他们很好地忍受。将进行三项研究。首先，将进行一项纵向研究，约1000名年轻人之间的威胁解释，社会退缩和孤独的嵌套访谈研究补充定量数据的跨时间关系进行检查。第二，一个生态瞬时评估研究，评估威胁解释真实的社会情况和孤独在一天中的几个时间，一周将进行调查这些关系在日常生活中。最后，我们将与一些年轻人一起为一个旨在修改威胁解释的培训计划开发一些材料。然后将这些建议提交给另一组青年人，以评估其相关性、可接受性以及这种干预措施的帮助和可行性。这些研究将产生数据，以支持进一步调查对青年人孤独感的认知干预，并促进从事青年工作的专业人员/从业人员、决策者、公众和青年人本身之间关于孤独感的全国对话。

项目成果

Developing an interpretation bias modification training task for alleviating loneliness in young people

开发解释偏差修正训练任务以缓解年轻人的孤独感

• DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2023.104380
• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: Behaviour Research and Therapy
• 影响因子: 4.1
• 作者: Riddleston L

Young people's recommended coping strategies to manage social isolation: Lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in the UK

年轻人管理社会隔离的建议应对策略：英国 COVID-19 大流行封锁的经验教训

• DOI: 10.1016/j.crbeha.2023.100133
• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: Current Research in Behavioral Sciences
• 作者: Jong A

Are biased interpretations of ambiguous social and non-social situations a precursor, consequence or maintenance factor of youth loneliness?

• DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2021.103829
• 发表时间: 2021-03-13
• 期刊: BEHAVIOUR RESEARCH AND THERAPY
• 影响因子: 4.1
• 作者: Lau, Jennifer Y. F.;Shariff, Rimsha;Meehan, Alan J.
• 通讯作者: Meehan, Alan J.

Restricted Visual Scanpaths During Emotion Recognition in Childhood Social Anxiety Disorder.

• DOI: 10.3389/fpsyt.2021.658171
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: Frontiers in psychiatry
• 影响因子: 4.7
• 作者: Kleberg JL;Löwenberg EB;Lau JYF;Serlachius E;Högström J
• 通讯作者: Högström J

Identifying characteristics of adolescents with persistent loneliness during COVID-19: A multi-country eight-wave longitudinal study

识别 COVID-19 期间持续孤独的青少年的特征：一项多国八波纵向研究

• DOI: 10.1002/jcv2.12206
• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: JCPP Advances
• 作者: Riddleston L