When you are lonely, look inside yourself: The moderating role of reflection in the relationship between loneliness and meaning in life

Abstract

Previous research revealed that loneliness was related to a lowered sense of meaning in life. Little is known, however, about the variables moderating the loneliness–meaning link. Being an attempt to fill this gap, the present study examined the potential protective role of curiosity-driven cognitive interest in the self—namely, reflection, in the relationship between loneliness and two measures of meaning: general evaluation of meaning in life (i.e., presence of meaning, POM) and recent meaningful experiences (RME). It was hypothesized that in individuals high in reflection loneliness would impact both measures of meaning to a smaller degree than in people with a low level of reflection. The cross-sectional study included 269 Polish participants aged 19–45 years (M = 25.65, SD = 6.1), who completed measures of loneliness, POM, RME, reflection, and rumination (the last of these was considered as a covariate). As predicted, the results demonstrated that loneliness was negatively related both to POM and to RME and that the strength of both relationships decreased with an increase in reflection. Thus, the current study adds to the literature pointing to reflection as a protective resource against the loss of meaning in consequence of subjectively perceived social isolation.