Not Just Social Isolation: Loneliness Comes in Many Forms
Research is examining new aspects and nuances of loneliness.
Posted May 14, 2026 | Reviewed by Devon Frye
Traditionally, loneliness has been defined in terms of lacking companionship or social isolation . In an eight-country study, Abdalla and colleagues (2026) found that nearly half of young persons aged 18 to 24 years responded “yes” to the question “Have you felt alone at any time during the past 12 months?” As loneliness was found to be strongly associated with depression and anxiety , studies such as this are the tip of the iceberg on a global public health concern, a pandemic that shows no signs of ebbing.
But researchers and helping professionals have begun to develop more nuanced understandings of the concept of loneliness. For instance, loneliness can be experienced by sociable folks even when they are surrounded by people at an event, and it can be experienced in the context of an intimate relationship, such as a marriage (just ask a couples therapist). While the emphasis on the social aspect of loneliness in psychology persists, other aspects of loneliness also exist.
Have you ever broached a topic with a friend, partner, co-worker, or a fellow attender at a social event and gotten no verbal response? People with sufficient social and communication skills can have experiences such as this when they cannot find a willing, able converser.
This experience of feeling separate and alone in spaces and relationships—when you have the requisite skills but just no one to share with—is referred to as epistemic loneliness (Alvarado, 2025) . It’s not just wanting “deep conversations.” It’s about wanting an exchange that’s not hemmed in or prematurely foreclosed by someone else’s urgent need to come quickly to “the one right answer.” It’s about having conversations where the partners are able to tolerate and sustain complexity and a more thorough examination of ideas.
Thus, there are cognitive forms of isolation in which one, trying to share rich mental aspects of one’s life, gets no response. In my attempts to develop a measure of epistemic loneliness, I included items focused on a wish to “play with ideas with others” or to discuss and untangle complex concepts or phenomena. An example of such an item might be “How often do you wish you could talk about ideas that really interest you but do not have someone to do this with?”
What People Struggling with Epistemic Loneliness Can Do
Many of my colleagues over the years have expressed the feeling of being “all dressed up but with nowhere to go” when they raise topics of interest to them, but they are met with no engagement from others. It is true that not everyone in our lives is willing and able to share their thoughts in response to ours, and so it is important to identify friends, colleagues, and social groups that share similar interests.
Yet there may be actions that individuals can take to help them manage these feelings. These include:
Because there's still much we don't know about epistemic loneliness, I am currently collecting data to develop a better way to measure it and investigate its impacts on persons' sense of well being. Ideally, this and other research will soon offer new ways to explore this distinct form of loneliness and better understand its impact on our social lives, emotional well-being, and public health.
Abdalla, S.M., Banda, B., Pickerel, M. Rosenberg, S., Sharma, S. & Galea, S. (2026). Loneliness, depression, and generalized anxiety across eight countries. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology , 61 (5), 909–924. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00127-025-03029-5
Alvarado, R. (2025). What is epistemic loneliness? Synthese, 205 (4), 1–28. https://philpapers.org/rec/ALVWIE
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Kyle D. Killian, Ph.D., LMFT is the author of Interracial Couples, Intimacy and Therapy: Crossing Racial Borders.
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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.