Fox, Robert and McHugh Power, Joanna and Coogan, Andrew and Beekman, Aartjan T.F. and van Tilburg, Theo and Hyland, Philip (2021) Posttraumatic stress disorder and loneliness are associated over time: A longitudinal study on PTSD symptoms and loneliness, among older adults. Psychiatry Research, 299 (113846). ISSN 0165-1781

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Abstract

Loneliness has a pernicious effect on mental health in later life and is likely to have a bidirectional relationship with psychopathology. However, longitudinal research examining loneliness and posttraumatic stress symptoms among older adults is scarce. This study aimed to examine the longitudinal relationship between different types of loneliness (social and emotional) and posttraumatic stress symptoms. Using two waves of an older adult sample (n = 1,276) from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA), this longitudinal relationship was examined using a multivariate two wave-latent change score (2W-LCS) model. There were significant, however, very small increases in both posttraumatic stress symptoms and emotional loneliness over time, whereas, average social loneliness scores did not significantly increase/decrease over time. Changes in both social (β = .16) and emotional loneliness (β = .15) were associated with small changes in posttraumatic stress symptoms, consistent with the existence of a longitudinal association between the constructs, net of covariate effects. Results provide evidence of the existence of a longitudinal association between subtypes of loneliness and posttraumatic stress symptoms, among older adults. Results have implications for clinicians who should identify individuals at risk of developing posttraumatic stress symptoms, and for the theory of both posttraumatic stress disorder and loneliness.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	©2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Cite as: Robert Fox, Joanna McHugh Power, Andrew N. Coogan, Aartjan T.F. Beekman, Theo G. van Tilburg, Philip Hyland, Posttraumatic stress disorder and loneliness are associated over time: A longitudinal study on PTSD symptoms and loneliness, among older adults, Psychiatry Research, Volume 299, 2021, 113846, ISSN 0165-1781, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2021.113846. (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165178121001438)
Keywords:	Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD); loneliness; emotional loneliness; social loneliness; mental health;
Academic Unit:	Assisting Living & Learning,ALL institute Faculty of Science and Engineering > Psychology Faculty of Science and Engineering > Research Institutes > Human Health Institute
Item ID:	15058
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2021.113846
Depositing User:	Dr. Andrew Coogan
Date Deposited:	24 Nov 2021 15:51
Journal or Publication Title:	Psychiatry Research
Publisher:	Elsevier
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	Publisher
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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