Risk and Protective Factors: Associations between Emotion Regulation Strategies and Loneliness

• Loneliness is associated with many negative outcomes, such as mental health disorders (depression, anxiety), physical health problems (cardiovascular disease, cancer), and an increased risk for mortality (Barjakova et al., 2023; Rodriguez et al., 2025; Wang et al., 2023). 

• It is important to identify modifiable protective and risk factors associated with loneliness. One such factor is the frequency with which people use emotion regulation strategies. 

• In this study, we explored how the frequent use of different emotion regulation strategies is associated with loneliness. 

• Hypotheses:

  • Adaptive strategies (such as exercise, seeking social support, etc.) are associated with lower loneliness.

  • Maladaptive strategies (such as avoidance, passive social media use, emotional eating, etc.) are associated with higher loneliness. 

Participants

• Participants were volunteers aged 18 or older and fluent in English (N = 300). 

  • Mage  = 40.4 Years, SDage  = 11.9; 159 female, 139 male; 69.7% White European, 14 % Black or African American, 7.3% Hispanic, and 5.7 Asian

Predictor Variables

• Emotion regulation strategies: Participants were asked to record how frequently they utilized these emotion regulation strategies.

  • Seeking social support

  • Exercise

  • Psychological Acceptance

  • Passive Social Media Use

  • Listening to Music

  • Distanced Self Talk

  • Emotional Eating

  • Cognitive Reappraisal 

  • Mindfulness

  • Avoidance

Outcome Variable

• UCLA Loneliness Scale (Hughes et al., 2004)

Analytical Strategy

• Bivariate correlations were performed for frequent regulation strategy use and loneliness.

• Perceptions of frequent use of various emotion regulation strategies are differentially associated with loneliness, identifying risk and protective factors.

• Risk factors include perception of frequent use of psychological avoidance, passive social media use, and emotional eating.

• Protective factors include perception of frequent use of seeking social support, exercise, and cognitive reappraisal.

• There was no significant relationship between loneliness and perception of frequent use of acceptance, mindfulness, music, or distanced self-talk. 

To see results, click here.

• Limitations:

• People’s perception of frequency and not the actual frequency of use.

• Limited range of emotion regulation strategies examined.

• A correlational study does not show causal effects.

• Perceptions of frequent use of seeking social support, exercise, and cognitive reappraisal are associated with less loneliness.

• Perceptions of frequent use of avoidance, passive social media use, and emotional eating are associated with more loneliness.

• Examine the long-term effects of emotion regulation strategies on loneliness.

• Expand research to include additional strategies, such as walking in nature, active social media use, and gratitude.

• Conduct experimental studies to determine a causal relationship between specific strategies and loneliness. 

Barjaková, M., Garnero, A., & d’Hombres, B. (2023). Risk factors for loneliness: A literature review. Social Science & Medicine, 334, 116163. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2023.116163 

Hughes, M. E., Waite, L. J., Hawkley, L. C., & Cacioppo, J. T. (2004). A short scale for measuring loneliness in large surveys: Results from two population-based studies. Research on Aging, 26(6), 655–672.

Rodriguez, M., Schertz, K. E., & Kross, E. (2025). How people think about being alone shapes their experience of loneliness. Nature Communications, 16(1), 1594. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-56764-3 

Wang, F., Gao, Y., Han, Z., Yu, Y., Long, Z., Jiang, X., Wu, Y., Pei, B., Cao, Y., Ye, J., Wang, M., & Zhao, Y. (2023). A systematic review and meta-analysis of 90 cohort studies of social isolation, loneliness and mortality. Nature Human Behaviour, 7(8), 1307–1319. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-023-01617-6 

• Career + Development: Strengthened pursuit of future research

• Critical Thinking: Interpreted patterns in the data 

• Teamwork: Collaborated successfully with Co-Author

• Technology: Gained proficiency in R for data analysis

Working in the Affective Science and Psychophysiology Lab (ASP Lab) and on this study has given me many skills outside the classroom at Miami University. My experience in this lab has given me the skills of career and development, critical thinking, teamwork, and technology. I have gained the career and development skill by strengthening my pursuit of future research through my honors thesis on loneliness. I am inspired to apply this skill in my honors thesis by generating ideas from our study's findings and incorporating them into my research. I have developed critical thinking by explaining why correlations among emotion regulation strategies are as they are and what patterns exist between them and loneliness. I have demonstrated teamwork by collaborating with my co-author. I strongly believe that collaborating with like-minded individuals, such as my co-author, further contributes to the conversation of science. I have developed technology skills through my proficiency in R for data analysis. Through this, I was able to clean the raw data and use bivariate correlations to create scatterplots and a correlation matrix. Overall, this experience has equipped me with the skills I need to pursue a career in clinical psychology. 

This study was approved by the Miami University Instritutional Review Board (#02421r) and was conducted by head researcher Darwin A. Guevarra PhD.