Macchia Lucía, Fett Anne-Kathrin
Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, School of Health and Medical Sciences, City St. George's, University of London, London, UK.
Department of Psychosis Studies, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, UK.
Sci Rep. 2025 Aug 20;15(1):30554. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-15151-0.
Loneliness has been found to be associated with high levels of physical pain, health problems, and poor mental health. Questions remain about how these factors are interrelated and how the relationships vary across sexes and the lifespan. Here, we used data from the 2023 and 2024 Gallup World Poll (GWP) to explore global associations between loneliness and physical pain, while accounting for health problems, and psychological distress. Our sample had data from 256,760 individuals aged 15-100 from 139 countries. Fully adjusted regressions showed that lonely individuals had 2.1 times higher odds of experiencing physical pain, had 1.8 times higher odds of having health problems, and were 25.8% more likely to experience distress than non-lonely ones. Demographic characteristics and satisfaction with social support and opportunities to meet people statistically accounted for 14% of the association between loneliness and pain. Health problems statistically accounted for 18.9% of the same association, whereas distress statistically accounted for 60.2%. In formal regression models, the associations between loneliness and pain were slightly more pronounced in females than males, but similar across ages. Our findings show a strong association between loneliness and physical pain, that was to a large degree statistically accounted for by psychological distress, and to a lesser extent by physical health, and socio-economic disadvantage. Importantly, these associations varied in strength across countries, pointing towards the importance of cultural factors. These findings shed light on the necessity for further cross-cultural and longitudinal research into the relationship among loneliness, pain, and distress.
研究发现，孤独与高水平的身体疼痛、健康问题及不良心理健康状况有关。这些因素之间如何相互关联，以及这些关系在不同性别和不同年龄段中如何变化，仍是未解之谜。在此，我们使用了2023年和2024年盖洛普世界民意调查（GWP）的数据，在考虑健康问题和心理困扰的同时，探索孤独与身体疼痛之间的全球关联。我们的样本包含来自139个国家的256,760名年龄在15至100岁之间的个体的数据。完全调整后的回归分析表明，孤独的个体经历身体疼痛的几率比非孤独个体高2.1倍，出现健康问题的几率高1.8倍，经历困扰的可能性比非孤独个体高25.8%。人口统计学特征以及对社会支持和结识他人机会的满意度在统计学上解释了孤独与疼痛之间关联的14%。健康问题在统计学上解释了同一关联的18.9%，而困扰在统计学上解释了60.2%。在正式回归模型中，孤独与疼痛之间的关联在女性中比在男性中略为明显，但在各年龄段中相似。我们的研究结果表明，孤独与身体疼痛之间存在强烈关联，这种关联在很大程度上在统计学上由心理困扰所解释，在较小程度上由身体健康和社会经济劣势所解释。重要的是，这些关联在不同国家的强度有所不同，这表明文化因素的重要性。这些发现揭示了进一步开展跨文化和纵向研究以探究孤独、疼痛和困扰之间关系的必要性。
