Solitude as Opportunity for Rest in Everyday Life of Adults across the Lifespan

一项针对世界各地成年人的跨文化调查显示了独处对日常休息的好处--这是现代社会继续忽视的一种重要的心理健康工具。我在博士培训期间的研究表明，只有15分钟的独处时间可以帮助我们摆脱激动人心的情绪，并提供安静思考的机会。然而，尽管独处的好处有目共睹，但我们似乎无法摆脱独处是负面的和具有挑战性的想法。将独处的享受归因于个人喜好是很直观的。这反映在我们经常听到的信息中，即内向的人更喜欢独处。现代社会也在继续强化悲伤孤独者的突出形象。这种对独处的狭隘看法造成了两个问题。首先，它为我们日常的独处经历画上了一道负面的光芒。其次，它阻止我们考虑环境和社会因素，这些因素可能会造成追求独处的障碍，并为了监管的好处而拥抱这一次。整个成年期的观察表明，对独处的渴望和从中受益的能力取决于生活环境。对于初出茅庐的成年人来说，在过渡到独立于父母照顾的过程中，关于独处时间的挣扎变得突出起来，比如那些大学一年级的人。对于这一群体来说，新的社会环境带来了社交的压力和对错过的恐惧，使独处的时间变得更加孤立和无法忍受。因此，初出茅庐的成年人不那么喜欢独处，尽管他们发现独处对生产力和情绪调节都有好处。另一方面，随着人们年龄的增长和责任的增加，他们独处的机会越来越少，独处成为一种渴望的奢侈品。对于有年幼子女的职业母亲来说尤其如此，因为妇女在全职工作的同时仍然不成比例地承担更多的照顾责任。许多母亲报告说，她们找不到自己的时间，也不能享受个人爱好和活动。这种为自己没有足够时间的挣扎在另一个过渡阶段发生了戏剧性的变化，届时成年人将离开劳动力大军，有更多的时间属于自己。在退休的前几年，人们经常报告说，不知道如何处理时间的增加。对于这一群体来说，孤独的挣扎表现为缺乏有意义地在孤独中挣扎空虚时间的策略，冒着增加无聊和孤独的风险。生活转变中的变化为研究态度和规范如何塑造成年人一生中应对孤独的能力创造了独特的背景。这项拟议的研究将招募这三个过渡阶段的参与者：过渡到大学、过渡到母亲和过渡到退休。找出我们孤独经历周围的障碍，将揭示为什么有些人不喜欢孤独或无法从孤独中获得监管好处的问题，并将为有针对性的干预提供信息。将采用定性和定量相结合的方法进行三项研究。研究一将通过对来自三个过渡群体的成年人的采访来了解人们如何看待孤独，以及他们的社会环境或生活环境是否允许他们有意义地参与孤独。研究二将跟踪人们在日常生活中独处的经历，以确定有助于改善情绪和幸福感的活动。最后，我将设计并测试一种干预措施，通过处理态度和规范，并建议让处于不同人生阶段的成年人更好地享受孤独，来改善独处时间的质量。心理健康专业人员、大学辅导员以及与父母和老年人一起工作的组织将对这项研究结果感兴趣，以促进积极利用独处时间来调节情绪和心理健康。

A cross-cultural survey of adults around the world demonstrates the benefit of solitude to daily rest - an essential tool to mental health that modern society continues to ignore. My research during Ph.D. training showed that only 15 minutes of solitude can help us rid of rousing emotions and offer opportunities for quiet reflection. Yet, despite the well-documented benefits of solitude, we cannot seem to shake off the idea that solitude is negative and challenging. It is intuitive to attribute enjoyment of solitude to a matter of individual preference. This is reflected in the messages that we hear often that introverts enjoy solitude better. Modern society also continues to reinforce salient image of a sad loner. This narrow perspective on solitude creates two problems. First, it paints a negative light around our daily experiences of solitude. Second, it prevents us from considering environmental and social factors that might create barriers to pursue solitude and embrace this time for its regulatory benefits. Observations across adulthood suggest that the desire for solitude and the ability to benefit from it depend on life situations. For emerging adults, salient struggles around time spent alone emerge during transition into being independent from parental care, such as for those in their first year at university. For this group, new social environment creates pressure to socialise and fear of missing out, making time spent alone more isolating and intolerable. As a result, emerging adults have less desire for solitude despite that they find it beneficial for productivity and emotion regulation. On the other hand, as people grow older and acquire more responsibilities, they have less opportunities for time alone and solitude becomes a craved luxury. This is particularly true for working mothers with young children as women still disproportionally take on more care responsibilities while working full time. Many mothers report not being able to find time for themselves or to enjoy personal hobbies and activities. This struggle of not having enough time for oneself changes drastically at another transition phase when adults leave the workforce and have more time on their own. Not knowing what to do with increase in time alone is frequently reported by those in the earlier years of retirement. For this group, struggles of solitude manifest in the lack of strategies to struggle empty time in solitude meaningfully, risking increase in boredom and loneliness. Changes during life transitions create unique contexts for an investigation of how attitudes and norms shape ability to cope with solitude across an adult's lifespan. This proposed research will recruit participants at these three transition phases: transition to university, transition to motherhood, and transition to retirement. Identifying barriers around our solitary experiences will shed light on the question of why some people do not like to be alone or are unable to gain regulatory benefits from it, and will inform targeted interventions. Three studies will be conducted using a mix of qualitative and quantitative approaches. Study 1 will use interviews with adults from three transition groups to understand how people often view solitude and whether their social environments or life circumstances allow them to engage meaningfully with solitude. Study 2 will track people's experiences with solitude in their daily life to identify activities that contribute to improved moods and well-being. Finally in , I will design and test an intervention to improve quality of time alone through tackling attitudes and norms and suggesting activities that allow adults at different stages of life enjoy their solitude better. The research findings will be of interest to mental health professionals, university counsellors, and organisations that work with parents and older adults, to foster positive uses of time alone for emotion regulation and psychological well-being.