Have you ever felt lonely? You probably have felt it. It is understandable when people sometimes feel lonely because as a social being, we need to have relationships with other people to fulfill our life. However, some people assume that feeling lonely means that the person is not independent. This is a wrong assumption.
Feeling lonely depends on our perspective about loneliness itself. It is subjective because social relationships that are expected by every individual can be different.
Do you want to know more about feeling lonely according to Psychology? If so, you are able to read the explanation below according to the Kampus Psychology site.
The Beginning of Psychological Loneliness Theory
A Psychiatrist, John Bowlby, in his theory, said that attachment theory emphasizes the importance of strong emotional bonds between infants and their caregivers. This becomes a pioneer of the temporary theory of loneliness.
From that perspective, the analogy is based on one of the four types of attachment theory, namely insecure/ avoidant attachment. What is insecure attachment? It is one of the four types of attachment theories, namely when parents as caregivers take care of their children in an insensitive way and easily refuse invitations from their children such as ignoring, ridiculing, or feeling annoyed with the child. When a child with an insecure attachment acts, and then he or she is shunned or rejected by his or her friends, this rejection or distance causes social skills to be hindered because he or she becomes a distrust with people so that it ends up in continued loneliness.
Emotional Approach
The attachment theory is used as the initial foundation of the development of the psychological theory of loneliness developed by a sociologist named Robert S. Weiss. He stated that there are six social needs that must be met, if not met, then these will contribute to our loneliness. The social needs are attachment, social integration, nurturing, feeling relied on in a friendship, reassurance of worth, and having guidance when experiencing difficult times.
Friendship can avoid feeling lonely, but it is important to note that it cannot replace an intimate relationship with our partner in preventing loneliness. So, it is natural when, for example, you have friends to hang out with but you feel upset when your girlfriend or boyfriend disappears. It is because friends and girlfriend or boyfriend have different levels of relationship. It means that the different levels of a relationship, the intimacy or familiarity of the relationship is an important influence. Weiss (1973) stated that intimate loneliness refers to a feeling of emptiness because of the absence of important people, for example, our partner who we usually rely on as our emotional support when we are in crisis, help each other, and respect each other.
Behavioral Approach
From the perspective of a behavioral approach, loneliness is always described through personality traits that usually relate to or contribute to harming relationships between humans and other humans. A simple example is loneliness must always be correlated with social anxiety, shame, distrust, and others. Basically, lonely people have difficulty in establishing and maintaining relationships.
Cognitive Approach
In the perspective of cognitive approach, loneliness is characterized by several differences that exist through existing perceptions and attributions. People who feel lonely tend to have pessimistic outlook on life and tend to blame themselves for not being able to get satisfaction in social relationships. This approach relates to attachment and behavioral perspectives through the previous discussion and loneliness is a self-fulfilling prophecy or an easy description of “guessing what will happen through the scenario you imagine” (Hawkley, 2018)
A small example of a self-fulfilling prophecy is that you assume that your friend doesn’t like you and then you try to prank your friend so that your friend feels annoyed and does not like your actions. The thing that you have to note is that your first assumption is wrong. However, since you prank your friend, then you indirectly justify your assumption so that your assumption becomes relevant.
Conclusion
Since everyone has a subjective perspective about loneliness, there is no standard of loneliness. However, loneliness is a natural thing experienced by all humans, especially when they grow up where everyone starts to focus on their respective goals.
Loneliness can be a natural thing where it will be passed, but it can also happen continuously. In certain cases, loneliness can be a problem because of the possibility of negative social expectations because the self-fulfilling prophecy always matches those expectations. So, there is a possibility that the person will cut off contact with people or cause a distrust when there is a match from the assumption of negative social expectations that they think.
A bookworm and researcher especially related to law and citizenship education. I spend time every day in front of the internet and the campus library.
