Short communication: The development of loneliness across the transition from primary to secondary school

Abstract

The transition from primary to secondary school is an impactful life event for early adolescents. This life event is hypothesized to be associated with increased feelings of loneliness, as it is often associated with changes in adolescents’ social network. However, this hypothesis has not been empirically tested so far. The present study aimed to fill this gap in the literature. A sample of 330 early adolescents (MageW1 = 10.73, SD = 0.46) were followed for three years. Between the second and the third wave, the secondary school transition occurred for most of the adolescents in the sample. Multi-level models with random intercepts were used to model the change in loneliness. A cross-level interaction was included to examine whether these changes in loneliness were associated with the secondary school transition. The results showed that loneliness decreased across the three waves for all adolescents. This decreasing developmental trend was not moderated by the secondary school transition. Our findings do not show that the secondary school transition is associated with increases in adolescent loneliness. That is, the decreasing developmental trend of loneliness across the three waves was the same for all adolescents. (189 words)

Keywords

• Loneliness
• Developmental trend
• School transition