Measuring your impact on loneliness in later life Dr. Kellie Payne Learning and Research Manager at the Campaign to End

Loneliness Measurement – Tools & Scales What is loneliness? No agreed definition Unwelcome, painful and unpleasant feeling Both number and depth of relationships Fluctuating, difficult to measure and identify Why measure loneliness? Lack of good quality evidence on ‘interventions’ Negative impact on mental and physical health Understand how people feel about connections

Why not social isolation, or wellbeing? Three distinct concepts Social isolation = objective measure Wellbeing = broader measure What is a scale? Consistent, numerical measurement of emotion Show how much of a difference you’ve made Compare the impact of different types of activities/services Loneliness Measurement – Tools & Scales

Loneliness is the distressing feeling that people experience when the amount or type of friendships / relationships that they have are less than they would like to have. Definition of loneliness

The tool contains the following statements: I am content with my friendships and relationships I have enough people I feel comfortable asking for help at any time My relationships are as satisfying as I would want them to be Campaign to End Loneliness Measurement Tool

Answers are as follows: Strongly Disagree / Disagree / Neutral / Agree / Strongly Agree / Don’t Know In order to avoid a ‘response set’ – where people give the same answer to a question almost by rote, it is important to alternate the direction of answers Asking all three of these questions together produces the most reliable Answers

The scores for each individual question need to be added together. This gives a possible range of scores from 0 to 12 Scoring

Campaign to End Loneliness Measurement Tool I am content with my friendships and relationships Strongly Disagree [4] Disagree [3] Neutral [2] Agree [1] Strongly Agree [0] I have enough people I feel comfortable asking for help at any time Strongly Agree [0] Agree [1] Neutral [2] Disagree [3] Strongly Disagree [4] My relationships are as satisfying as I would want them to be Strongly Disagree [4] Disagree [3] Neutral [2] Agree [1] Strongly Agree [0]

Positive language about a tricky issue: written in language which is non-intrusive and unlikely to cause any embarrassment or distress. Practical: very practical resource for organisations in the field to use in their face-to-face work with older people. Co-designed: with a number of different people and organisations, to try and ensure it is appropriate for a ranges of contexts. Length: kept as short as possible and is easy to score. Validity: has undergone academic tests to ensure it is valid and reliable. Strengths

Newness: not yet been used extensively by services, so we do not yet know how it picks up changes over time Only using positive language: The use of only positive worded questions could lead to respondents under-reporting their loneliness Not a screening tool: strongly advise organisations not to use these questions as a “screening tool” to establish eligibility to their services. It has not been designed for this purpose and may therefore give misleading results. Limitations

De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale Definition based upon Weiss (1973) theory – emotional and social loneliness Overall score of 0-6 (two 0-3 subscales) Strengths Different types of loneliness Designing with and for older people Extensively used and validated Limitations Length Training/support needed for negative Qs

De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale I experience a general sense of emptiness Yes [1]More or less [1]No [0] There are plenty of people I can rely on when I have problems Yes [0]More or less [1]No [1] There are many people I can trust completely Yes [0]More or less [1]No [1] I miss having people around me Yes [1]More or less [1]No [0] There are enough people I feel close to Yes [0]More or less [1]No [1] I often feel rejected Yes [1]More or less [1]No [0]

De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale Definition based upon Weiss (1973) theory – emotional and social loneliness Overall score of 0-6 (two 0-3 subscales) Strengths Different types of loneliness Designing with and for older people Extensively used and validated Limitations Length Training/support needed for negative Qs

UCLA Loneliness Scale Cognitive discrepancy – “mismatch” Overall score of 3-9 Strengths Widely used Well tested and validated Compare to national studies/data Limitations Originally developed with USA students ‘Response set’ Training/support needed for negative Qs

UCLA Loneliness Scale How often do you feel that you lack companionship? Hardly ever [1]Some of the time[2]Often [3] How often do you feel left out? Hardly ever [1]Some of the time[2]Often [3] How often do you feel isolated from others? Hardly ever [1]Some of the time[2]Often [3]

Single questions Strengths Short – each to insert into M&E Age-friendly – if communicating is difficult Commonly used in research Limitations May not be reliable May be too blunt Limitations of time period Challenges or ignores stigma?

Single questions How often do you feel lonely? Hardly ever or never Some of the time Often During the past week, have you felt lonely: Rarely or none of the time (e.g. less than 1 day) Some or a little of the time (e.g. 1-2 days) Occasionally or a moderate amount of time (e.g. 3-4 days) All of the time (e.g. 5-7 days)

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