Abstract P543: Longitudinal Change in Perceived Loneliness Among Older Adults During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) Study

Introduction: We and others observed that social distancing enforced early in the COVID-19 pandemic led to an increase in loneliness, a social condition associated with adverse mental and physical health outcomes. Here, we examine longitudinal changes in perceived loneliness over the first two years of the COVD-19 pandemic among older adults participating in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) Study. Hypothesis: Perceived loneliness decreased over the course of the pandemic. Methods: The UCLA 3-item Loneliness questionnaire, which assesses lack of companionship, feeling left out, and feeling isolated, to classify level of perceived loneliness, was administered to ARIC participants in March-October 2020 and again in August 2020-March 2022 as part of the Colllaborative Cohort of Cohorts for COVID-19 Research (C4R). Prepandemic measures (Jan-March 2020) were available in a subset. For each item, response categories “hardly ever”, “some of the time” and “often” were scored from 1 to 3, respectively, and added to create a final score ranging from 3 to 9 (higher scores indicating greater loneliness). T-tests were used to compare mean loneliness score values between the measurement periods. Mixed effects linear regression models were fit to examine predictors of change in the loneliness score. Results: Among 2,335 ARIC cohort participants with repeat assessments of loneliness during the COVID-19 pandemic (mean age 82.4 (SD 4.4) years, 64.8% female, 18.5% Black), mean perceived loneliness score decreased from 4.40 (SD 1.51) to 3.78 (SD 1.25) (p-value <0.01) over median follow-up of 10.7 (SD 3.8) months. In 516 participants with pre-pandemic measures, the mean perceived loneliness score was 3.63 (SD 1.13). In analyses adjusted for age, the decrease in the loneliness score during the pandemic was greater by 0.65 (95% CI: 0.46, 0.84) units among Black, as compared to White participants. Male sex was likewise associated with a 0.89 (95% CI: 0.77, 1.02) unit decrease in the loneliness score. No differences were observed by educational attainment, age, or levels of the Area Deprivation Index. Conclusion: Despite reporting greater loneliness during the first six months of the COVID-19 pandemic compared to the time prior to the pandemic, older adults reported similar levels of perceived loneliness in the second year of the pandemic compared to pre-pandemic levels. In particular, Black race and and male sex were associated with greater reductions in loneliness over the pandemic period. These results suggest that older adults were psychologically resilient with respect to the extreme social changes associated with the COVID-19 pandemic.