From 2021 to 2024, the Campaign to End Loneliness was generously hosted by the What Works Centre for Wellbeing, the UK’s leading authority on wellbeing evidence, policy and practice. The Centre operated from 2014 to 2024 and during this time it supported the national conversation and action on loneliness.  Social connection is one of the…
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Claire Du Preez, Communities Programme Manager at Sky, highlights the impact of our partnership. A huge thank to our partners at Sky who have made many of our events possible due to their generous sponsorship.  “Sky has been proud to work in partnership with the Campaign” Loneliness is a complex issue which can pervade all…
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Principle Investigator Prof Jennifer Lau and Research Associates Dr Laura Riddleston (Queen Mary University of London) and Dr Lily Verity (University of Manchester) explain the initial findings of their research project: the Youth Loneliness Scale (YLS).  Lily Verity will be presenting at the Campaign to End Loneliness conference on Thursday 8 February for our session…
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Sara Ryan, Manchester Metropolitan University and Jane Maddison, University of York Accelerated Experience-Based Co-Design We recently completed a research project, funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research, to explore whether an effective approach to co-designing improvements in healthcare would transfer to a social care setting, using loneliness support as our exemplar. This…
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We hear from from Dr Amy Johnson, Dr Gill McGill and Dr Gemma Wilson-Menzfeld on their research which aimed to explore the levels and experiences of Military Widows’ social isolation and loneliness, as well as to identify what available services exist to help Military Widows.  Lack of existing evidence Feelings of loneliness and isolation can…
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Yung-Chia Hsueh, UCL Division of Psychiatry and Dr Alexandra Pitman, UCL Division of Psychiatry; Camden and Islington NHS Foundation Trust summarise findings from their systematic review which aimed to bring together the research literature describing the effectiveness, acceptability and potential harms of community interventions that target place-based factors to address loneliness and mental health.  Humans…
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Why are LGBTQ people more likely to be lonelier than heterosexuals peers?  This blog by Eddy Elmer, MA; PhD Student, Dept. of Sociology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam outlines the findings of a new large-scale study which he co-authored with Theo Van Tilburg and Tineke Fokkema. Read the full paper:  Minority Stress and Loneliness in a Global…
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Professor Carolyn Chew-Graham, a GP and researcher in the mental health of older people based at Keele University, has written a blog for us, about her new research, funded by NIHR, to develop and study an intervention which aims to help old people who have been isolated during the COVID-19 restrictions. Impact of COVID-19 restrictions…
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Social prescribing is a big part of the loneliness strategy in England as well as the NHS Long Term Plan. On May 15th we held our latest Research and Policy Hub meeting, looking at how social prescribing might be able to tackle loneliness across the UK.  Social prescribing on the front line We think there…
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Researcher Dhruv Sharma asks why in this ‘age of connectivity’, with so much research already carried out on loneliness interventions for older adults, we haven’t yet been able to solve the problem of chronic loneliness.  “Our bodies and minds are not designed for lonely lives”  When talking about the ‘social’ nature of human beings, noted…
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