ReviewPhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences2015
Perceived social isolation, evolutionary fitness and health outcomes: a lifespan approach.
Review in Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 170 papers, 6 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
170 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- The Association Between Child Maltreatment and Loneliness Across the Lifespan: A Systematic Review and Multilevel Meta-Analysis.Child maltreatment · 2024Pooled it
- Social isolation as a risk factor for all-cause mortality: Systematic review and meta-analysis of cohort studies.PloS one · 2023Pooled it
- Are social isolation and loneliness associated with cognitive decline in ageing?Frontiers in aging neuroscience · 2023Pooled it
- A Systematic Review of the Development and Psychometric Properties of Loneliness Measures for Children and Adolescents.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Pooled it
- Pooled it
- The Stability and Change of Loneliness Across the Life Span: A Meta-Analysis of Longitudinal Studies.Personality and social psychology review : an official journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc · 2020Pooled it
- Self-Care Program as a Tool for Alleviating Anxiety and Loneliness and Promoting Satisfaction With Life in High School Students and Staff: Randomized Survey Study.JMIR formative research · 2024Trial
- Impact of the Heartfulness program on loneliness in high schoolers: Randomized survey study.Applied psychology. Health and well-being · 2023Trial
- Comparison of the 18-item and 6-item Lubben Social Network Scales with community-dwelling older adults in Mongolia.PloS one · 2019Trial
- Depressive Symptom Trajectories and Incident Pain: The Role of Nocturnal Sleep Duration in Two Prospective Cohort Studies.Journal of prevention (2022) · 2026Article
- The dynamic interplay between loneliness and health behaviors from adolescence to midlife: A Norwegian population-based cohort study.Psychological medicine · 2026Article
- Loneliness in prostate cancer survivors.Journal of cancer research and clinical oncology · 2026Article
- The Pathway From Loneliness to Chronic Diseases: Examining the Mediating Roles of Depression and Self-Perceived Health, and the Moderating Effect of Age Among Older Adults in Israel.Journal of applied gerontology : the official journal of the Southern Gerontological Society · 2026Article
- The Bidirectional Relationship between Hope, Prosocial Behavior and Loneliness in Chinese Adolescents.Journal of youth and adolescence · 2026Article
- Loneliness and adolescent mental health: a multilevel examination of socio-ecological factors across Czech schools.Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health · 2026Article
- Aerobic Exercise for Cognitive and Functional Enhancement in Schizophrenia: Evidence, Mechanisms, and Practical Recommendations.Schizophrenia bulletin open · 2026Article
- Both family and peer relationships matter in late adolescence: a network analysis of loneliness and social connection in a UK cohort.BMJ public health · 2026Article
- Association of social isolation and loneliness with the incidence and life expectancy of chronic kidney disease: a population-based cohort study.International journal of surgery (London, England) · 2026Article
- Willingness to trust is reduced by loneliness and paranoia.Communications psychology · 2025Article
- The effect of burden and loneliness on depression in female caregivers through purpose in life.BMC public health · 2025Article
110 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Sociality permeates each of the fundamental motives of human existence and plays a critical role in evolutionary fitness across the lifespan. Evidence for this thesis draws from research linking deficits in social relationship--as indexed by perceived social isolation (i.e. loneliness)--with adverse health and fitness consequences at each developmental stage of life. Outcomes include depression, poor sleep quality, impaired executive function, accelerated cognitive decline, unfavourable cardiovascular function, impaired immunity, altered hypothalamic pituitary-adrenocortical activity, a pro-inflammatory gene expression profile and earlier mortality. Gaps in this research are summarized with suggestions for future research. In addition, we argue that a better understanding of naturally occurring variation in loneliness, and its physiological and psychological underpinnings, in non-human species may be a valuable direction to better understand the persistence of a 'lonely' phenotype in social species, and its consequences for health and fitness.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.