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Evolutionary mechanisms for loneliness
Open accessAbstract
Robert Weiss (1973) conceptualised loneliness as perceived social isolation, which he described as a gnawing, chronic disease without redeeming features. On the scale of everyday life, it is understandable how something as personally aversive as loneliness could be regarded as a blight on human existence. However, evolutionary time and evolutionary forces operate at such a different scale of organisation than we experience in everyday life that personal experience is not sufficient to understand the role of loneliness in human existence. Research over the past decade suggests a very different view of loneliness than suggested by personal experience, one in which loneliness serves a variety of adaptive functions in specific habitats. We review evidence on the heritability of loneliness and outline an evolutionary theory of loneliness, with an emphasis on its potential adaptive value in an evolutionary timescale.
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“However, chronic loneliness poses potential risks due to its tendency to create a self-reinforcing loneliness loop where lonely persons become increasingly distrustful of others and anticipate negative relationships, and as a result, they would prefer to avoid future social interactions.85”
From A Longitudinal Study of Loneliness Before the End of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Trajectories, Predictors, and Impact on Chinese Adolescent Mental Health (2024) · cites this paper as [85]
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“Researchers have suggested that transient loneliness may serve an evolutionary purpose by prompting people to reestablish connections for the sake of survival and genetic continuity.85”
From A Longitudinal Study of Loneliness Before the End of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Trajectories, Predictors, and Impact on Chinese Adolescent Mental Health (2024) · cites this paper as [85]
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“The evolutionary perspective of loneliness proposed by Cacioppo and colleagues (2006;Cacioppo, Cacioppo, & Boomsma, 2014) presents loneliness as an adaptive signal, similar to hunger and thirst, that motivates one to alter behavior in a way that will increase survival.”
From Loneliness and Social Isolation as Risk Factors for Mortality: A Meta-Analytic Review (2015) · cites this paper as Cacioppo, Cacioppo, & Boomsma, 2014
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“This model proposes that loneliness operates as an aversive signal designed to promote adaptation to the vulnerabilities of being alone and motivate reconnection32.”
From Neural mechanisms of social homeostasis (2019) · cites this paper as [32]
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Friendship Preferences: Examining Desirable and Undesirable Traits in a Friend
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“For instance, loneliness is an emotional mechanism which motivates social contact when people find themselves lacking social input (Apostolou, 2016; Cacioppo et al., 2014; see also Tooby & Cosmides, 2008).”
BackgroundFranco-O´Byrne, D., González-Gómez, R., Sepúlveda, J. P. M., Vergara, M., Ibáñez, A. M., & Huepe, D. (2023) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1096178 · Cited by 18
“First, the diminished social reward experienced in loneliness can limit social engagement and participation in cognitively stimulating and mood-lifting activities, thereby increasing negative mood and depressive symptoms (Cacioppo et al., 2014; Tan et al., 2020).”
BackgroundCard, K. G., & Skakoon‐Sparling, S. (2023) · Health Psychology Open · doi:10.1177/20551029231184034 · Cited by 21
Psychosocial risk profiles among older adults living alone in South Korea: A latent profile analysis
Lee, C., Cho, B., Yang, Q., Chang, S. J., Ko, H., Yi, Y. M., Cho, H.-R., & Park, Y. (2021) · Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics · doi:10.1016/j.archger.2021.104429 · Cited by 19
Four Types of Anti-Loneliness Policies
de Vries, B. (2022) · doi:10.1093/oso/9780198871194.003.0015 · Cited by 17
Lonely for Touch? A Narrative Review on the Role of Touch in Loneliness
Noone, C., & McKenna-Plumley, P. E. (2022) · Behaviour Change · doi:10.1017/bec.2022.12 · Cited by 19
Borawski, D. (2022) · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health · doi:10.3390/ijerph19169948 · Cited by 15
“The interrelationships between loneliness, POS, and MIL can be interpreted in light of the evolutionary theory of loneliness [43].”
BackgroundLi, J., Cheskin, L. J., Frankenfeld, C. L., Rana, Z. H., & de Jonge, L. (2022) · Journal of American College Health · doi:10.1080/07448481.2022.2141060 · Cited by 17
“18 However, few studies have examined whether feeling lonely is linked to unhealthy eating behavior and certain nutrient intake in college students through dietary surveys.”
Loneliness and cortisol are associated with social network regulation
Kornienko, O., Schaefer, D. R., Ha, T., & Granger, D. A. (2020) · Social Neuroscience · doi:10.1080/17470919.2019.1709540 · Cited by 21
Milicev, J., Qualter, P., Goodfellow, C., Inchley, J., Simpson, S. A., Leyland, A. H., Kharicha, K., & Long, E. (2022) · Journal of Public Health · doi:10.1007/s10389-022-01719-x · Cited by 19
“From the evolutionary perspective (Cacioppo et al. 2014; Qualter et al. 2015), negative feelings that characterise loneliness serve an adaptive purpose of motivating the person to seek social contact to increase the chances of survival.”
BackgroundWelch, V. A., Ghogomu, E. T., Barbeau, V. I., Boulton, E., Boutin, S., Haitas, N., Kneale, D., Salzwedel, D. M., Simard, R., Herbert, P., et al. (2022) · Campbell Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1002/cl2.1260 · Cited by 19
Lam, C. L. M., Yu, J., & Lee, T. M. C. (2016) · Aging Neuropsychology and Cognition · doi:10.1080/13825585.2016.1226246 · Cited by 20
Does Trait Loneliness Predict Rejection of Social Robots?
Li, S., Xu, L., Yu, F., & Peng, K. (2020) · ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) · doi:10.1145/3319502.3374777 · Cited by 20
“When such a need for social connection cannot be met, people become lonely [8, 10] and are more inclined to anthropomorphize objects [22]: that is, they adapt to loneliness by projecting human attributes onto nonhuman agents.”
BackgroundLiu, S., Zeng, Z., Qi, Q., Yang, Q., & Hu, Y. (2024) · Psychology Research and Behavior Management · doi:10.2147/prbm.s460393 · Cited by 21
“9 However, current research on loneliness has primarily focused on environmental and behavioral studies, with very little research examining the relationship between genes and the environmental context.”
Ng, T. K. S., Beck, T. L., Dennis, K. R., Desai, P., Krueger, K. R., Dhana, K., Wilson, R. S., Evans, D. A., & Rajan, K. B. (2025) · The Journal of Prevention of Alzheimer s Disease · doi:10.1016/j.tjpad.2024.100046 · Cited by 18
Loneliness in Bereavement: Measurement Matters
Vedder, A., Stroebe, M. S., Schut, H. A. W., Boerner, K., Stokes, J. E., & Boelen, P. A. (2021) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.741762 · Cited by 21
Socioemotional mechanisms of loneliness in subclinical psychosis
Leathem, L. D., Currin, D. L., Montoya, A. K., & Karlsgodt, K. H. (2021) · Schizophrenia Research · doi:10.1016/j.schres.2021.10.002 · Cited by 18
Billah, M. A., Akhtar, S., & Khan, M. N. (2023) · BMC Psychology · doi:10.1186/s40359-023-01180-9 · Cited by 19
“These factors deteriorate social and personal attachment [16, 17].”
BackgroundInfluentialWhat allays loneliness? A fine-grained examination of daily social interactions
Silva, G., Rum, R., Brennan, J., Rottenberg, J. A., & Goodman, F. R. (2023) · Journal of Social and Personal Relationships · doi:10.1177/02654075231181709 · Cited by 19
Abplanalp, S. J., Reavis, E. A., Le, T. P., & Green, M. F. (2024) · NPP—Digital Psychiatry and Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/s44277-024-00004-x · Cited by 17
“According to evolutionary theories, loneliness is a sign that changes in the social environment are not optimal and that the individual should return to social homeostasis [28, 30, 31].”
Wu, Y., Cornally, N., O’Donovan, Á., Kilty, C., Li, A., & Wills, T. (2025) · International Journal of Mental Health Nursing · doi:10.1111/inm.13484 · Cited by 20
Borawski, D., Siudak, A., Pawelec, A., Rozpara, B., & Zawada, M. (2020) · Personality and Individual Differences · doi:10.1016/j.paid.2020.110580 · Cited by 16
Opioid Regulation of Social Homeostasis: Connecting Loneliness to Addiction
Løseth, G. E., Eikemo, M., & Leknes, S. (2024) · Biological Psychiatry · doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2024.11.011 · Cited by 16
“Loneliness is a highly aversive state that is thought to have evolved to promote affiliative behaviors (24), which are life supporting in social animals (25).”
Metadata
- Authors
- Cacioppo, J. T., Cacioppo, S., & Boomsma, D. I.
- Affiliations
- University of Chicago (US)
- Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (NL)
- Corresponding author
- Cacioppo, John T.
- Venue
- Cognition and Emotion
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2013-09-25
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 3-21
- ISSN
- 0269-9931 (ISSN-L)
- 1464-0600
- PMC
- PMC3855545
- OpenAlex
- W2109338375
- Cited by
- 576
- References
- 127
- Citations by year
- 2026: 61 · 2025: 86 · 2024: 80 · 2023: 65 · 2022: 69 · 2021: 50 · 2020: 52 · 2019: 30 · 2018: 27 · 2017: 23 · 2016: 12 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 2
- FWCI
- 14.45
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Cognition & Emotion (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- VU Research Portal (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute on Aging (P01AG018911, R37AG033590, R01AG034052, R01AG033590)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion
- Social Sciences › Health › Health disparities and outcomes
- Keywords
- loneliness, social isolation
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Biological Evolution, Humans, Loneliness, Psychological Theory
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