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The relationships between social support and loneliness: A meta-analysis and review
Open accessAbstract
The loneliness of modern people is becoming more and more prominent, and has brought profoundly negative effects on mental health. Social support is an important predictor of loneliness. However, the size of the correlation reported by studies on the relation between social support and loneliness varies greatly. The aim of this meta-analysis is to determine the relation between social support and loneliness. One hundred and seventy-seven articles (N = 113,427) were identified, and robust variance estimation with random effects were used. As expected, higher levels of social support were negatively correlated with loneliness (r = -0.39). The association between social support and loneliness were also moderated by several variables. Specifically, the negative relationship between loneliness and social support among rural populations is stronger than that of urban populations in Chinese samples, the effect of perceived social support (r = -0.45) on loneliness is greater than that of other social supports (r = -0.36), and the friend support (r = -0.48) played a more important role in reducing loneliness than that of two other supports (family support: r = -0.34; significant other support: r = -0.40). The current results support robust links between social support and loneliness, emphasizing the important role of social support in reducing levels of loneliness, this may have some implications for future research and loneliness treatments.
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“Loneliness and social support have an inverse relationship: people who feel socially supported are less subject to loneliness (Matthews et al., 2016; Teo et al., 2013; Zhang and Dong, 2022).”
From Social connections combat loneliness and promote wellbeing among college students coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic (2025) · cites this paper as Zhang and Dong, 2022
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“As found in previous studies, low levels SS was associated with QoL decline [22], loneliness [23], depression [24], and mortality [25].”
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“This transformative capacity extends recent meta-analytic evidence documenting that social support, when cognitively processed through reframing lenses, effectively buffers loneliness impacts (Zhang & Dong, 2022).”
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Exploring community connections: neighborhood amenities and loneliness among Chinese immigrants
Auchincloss, A. H., Fang, C. Y., Sun, J., Walton, E., Li, M., Zhong, J., & Tseng, M. (2026) · BMC Public Health · doi:10.1186/s12889-026-26984-3
“As such, these places may serve to cultivate social bonds with other community members [52] which ultimately may protect against or reduce lone-liness [54].”
Bioethics and the Culture of Loneliness
Gosić, N., & Tomak, T. (2026) · Science, Art and Religion. · doi:10.5005/jp-journals-11005-0133
Tang, Z.-Y., Ji, Y.-Q., Zhu, Y.-S., Xiang, H.-B., & Ye, Q. (2026) · Frontiers in Public Health · doi:10.3389/fpubh.2026.1701136
“Previous studies confirmed that social support was significantly negatively correlated with loneliness (62, 63).”
Bista, S., Thierry, B., Kestens, Y., & Moullec, G. (2026) · Psychology, Health & Medicine · doi:10.1080/13548506.2026.2632839
Hutchison, M., Henderson‐Matthews, B., Wood, Z. J., Kothe, R., Runner, G. H., Johnson, L. R., Lafromboise, M. E., Malatare, M., Salois, E. M., Carter, J. R., et al. (2026) · International Journal of Behavioral Medicine · doi:10.1007/s12529-025-10420-8
“First, loneliness is often inversely related to social support; individuals who are lonely tend to isolate themselves more, resulting in less social support, while those with stronger social networks report feeling less lonely [33].”
Schenke, K. C., Foster, J., & Stephens-Lewis, D. (2026) · Journal of Health Psychology · doi:10.1177/13591053251410690
“These findings replicate broader evidence that suggests the support offered by friends has a greater impact on reducing loneliness than the support of family (Zhang and Dong, 2022), highlighting the nuanced role of family relationships.”
Borshchevskyi, V., & Tsybulska, J. (2026) · Problemy Polityki Społecznej. Studia i Dyskusje · doi:10.31971/pps/214249
“Consistent with this, meta-analytic evidence shows a robust negative association between perceived social support and loneliness across contexts, underscoring the public-health and economic salience of connectivity (Zhang & Dong, 2022).”
Zhang, H., & Zhu, S. (2026) · Frontiers in Public Health · doi:10.3389/fpubh.2025.1718222 · Cited by 1
“The positive interaction between social participation and acceptance ( b = 0.291, p 0.001, Table 4) indicates that the association between acceptance and improvement is strongest among those who are more socially active (105).”
InfluentialBrindal, E., Bainbridge, T. F., & Kakoschke, N. (2026) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1627029
Cipolletta, S., Franzin, C., & Rossi, V. (2026) · Health & Social Care in the Community · doi:10.1155/hsc/1270437
Akyol, E. Y., & Öztemel, K. (2025) · Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Eğitim Dergisi · doi:10.52597/buje.1757891 · Cited by 1
Growth Mindset Mediates the Influence of Social Support on Interest in Continuing Higher Education
Makmun, S., Mustari, M., Suyitno, I., Jamalong, A., Najamuddin, N., & Sahabuddin, R. (2025) · Mimbar Ilmu · doi:10.23887/mi.v30i3.103408
Loneliness in spinal cord injury: A systematic review and comparison with the general population
O’Donnell, L. M. C., Dorstyn, D., & Barclay, L. (2025) · Journal of Spinal Cord Medicine · doi:10.1080/10790268.2025.2593074
“Similar trends are observed in the general community (62, 63).”
Self-Efficacy Mediating the Influence of Social Support on Interest in Continuing Higher Education
Makmun, S., Mustari, M., Suyitno, I., Jamalong, A., Najamuddin, N., & Sahabuddin, R. (2025) · IJECA (International Journal of Education and Curriculum Application) · doi:10.31764/ijeca.v8i3.35444
“This finding demonstrates the importance of continuous and multidimensional social support, encompassing emotional, instrumental, informational, and reward support (Jolly et al., 2021; Zhang & Dong, 2022).”
Wang, X. (2025) · Journal of Family Violence · doi:10.1007/s10896-025-01019-4
Fang, S., & Leung, C. H. (2025) · Aging & Mental Health · doi:10.1080/13607863.2025.2593976
“…with previous research, a low level of self-esteem may be a risk factor for loneliness (Szcześniak et al., 2020; Vanhalst et al., 2013; Zhou et al., 2020), while perceived support from social relations may help to alleviate loneliness (Chen et al., 2014; Eskimez et al., 2019; Zhang & Dong, 2022).”
The etiology of loneliness: insights from twin and family, genome-wide, and epigenetic studies
Freilich, C. D., & Krueger, R. F. (2025) · Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.cobeha.2025.101618
Reduced Loneliness in People With Visual Impairments Using Interconnected Smart Technologies
Kim, H. N., & Ugboya, I. (2025) · Journal of Visual Impairment & Blindness · doi:10.1177/0145482x251396972
“Zhang and Dong (2022) conducted a systematic review of 177 articles, revealing accumulating evidence that social support was negatively correlated with loneliness.”
Leung, M.-K., Poon, K., Wong, N. M. L., Lam, H.-C., & Lau, W. K. (2025) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1654908
“For instance, a recent meta-analysis demonstrated a negative association between loneliness levels and perceived social support in real life (Zhang and Dong, 2022), suggesting that people who perceive fewer actual social support feel lonelier, whereas people who have more actual social support are…”
Metadata
- Authors
- Zhang, X., & Dong, S.
- Affiliations
- Jiangxi Normal University (CN)
- Corresponding author
- Zhang, Xing
- Venue
- Acta Psychologica
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2022-07
- Volume
- 227
- Pages
- 103616
- ISSN
- 0001-6918 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W4280498737
- Cited by
- 222
- References
- 47
- Citations by year
- 2026: 75 · 2025: 82 · 2024: 44 · 2023: 19 · 2022: 2
- FWCI
- 5.09
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Acta Psychologica (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- Jiangxi Normal University Yaohu Campus (JD20061)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Health › Health disparities and outcomes
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Attachment and Relationship Dynamics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Health and Well-being Studies
- Keywords
- social support, loneliness, perceived social support, friend support, family support, significant other support, urban-rural differences, Chinese adults, mental health
- MeSH terms
- Humans, Loneliness, Social Support, Asian People
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