The Relation of Loneliness and Self-Disclosure

Abstract

Loneliness... is the exceedingly unpleasant and driving experience connected with inadequate discharge of the need for human intimacy, for interpersonal intimacy. (Sullivan, 1953, p. 290) Loneliness appears to be a largely subjective experience associated with a perceived lack of interpersonal intimacy. (Chelune, Sultan, & Williams, 1980, p. 462) The phenomenological experience of loneliness appears to be at least as much a function of the intimacy and privacy of one's social intercourse as the sheer quantity of time spent in the presence of others. (Franzoi & Davis, 1985, p. 768) Individuals... attribute their loneliness feelings above all to the lack of an opportunity to talk about personally important, private matters with someone else. (Sermat & Smyth, 1973, p. 332)