Abstract
Loneliness is an adverse phenomenon that tends to peak during adolescence. As loneliness is a subjective state, it is different from the objective state of being alone. People’s attitudes toward being alone can be more or less negative or positive. Cultures differ in the form and meaning of social behavior, interpersonal relationships, and time spent alone. However, for cross-cultural comparisons to be meaningful, measurement invariance of the measure should be established. The present study examined measurement invariance of the Loneliness and Aloneness Scale for Children and Adolescents (LACA) in a sample of 218 Belgian and 190 Chinese early adolescents, aged 11–15 years. Using nested multigroup confirmatory factor analyses, measurement invariance of the LACA across Belgium and China was established. More specifically, evidence was found for configural, metric, and partial scalar invariance. Because partial scalar invariance was established, the two cultural groups could be compared. No significant differences were found for peer-related loneliness. Regarding the attitudes toward aloneness, Belgian adolescents were more negative and less positive toward being alone than Chinese adolescents. The present study is encouraging for researchers who want to use the LACA for cross-cultural comparisons, in that we found evidence for measurement invariance across two disparate cultural groups speaking completely different languages.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Asher, S. R., Hymel, S., & Renshaw, P. D. (1984). Loneliness in children. Child Development, 55, 1456–1464. doi:10.2307/1130015.
Averill, J. R., & Sundararajan, L. (2014). Experiences of solitude. In R. J. Coplan & J. C. Bowker (Eds.), The handbook of solitude: Psychological perspectives on social isolation, social withdrawal, and being alone (pp. 90–108). New York, NY: Wiley.
Bandalos, D. L. (2002). The effects of item parceling on goodness-of-fit and parameter estimate bias in structural equation modeling. Structural Equation Modeling, 9, 78–102. doi:10.1207/S15328007SEM0901_5.
Byrne, B. M., Shavelson, R. J., & Muthen, B. (1989). Testing for the equivalence of factor covariance and mean structures: The issue of partial measurement invariance. Psychological Bulletin, 105, 456–466.
Byrne, B. M., & Watkins, D. (2003). The issue of measurement invariance revisited. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 34, 155–175. doi:10.1177/0022022102250225.
Chen, F. F. (2007). Sensitivity of goodness of fit indexes to lack of measurement invariance. Structural Equation Modeling, 14, 464–504. doi:10.1080/10705510701301834.
Chen, X., & French, D. C. (2008). Children’s social competence in cultural context. Annual Review of Psychology, 59, 591–616. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.59.103006.093606.
Chen, X., He, Y., Oliveira, A. M. D., Coco, A. L., Zappulla, C., Kaspar, V., & DeSouza, A. (2004). Loneliness and social adaptation in Brazilian, Canadian, Chinese and Italian children: A multi-national comparative study. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 45, 1373–1384. doi:10.1111/j.1469-7610.2004.00329.x.
Cheung, G. W., & Rensvold, R. B. (2002). Evaluating goodness-of-fit indexes for testing measurement invariance. Structural Equation Modeling, 9, 233–255. doi:10.1207/S15328007SEM0902_5.
Cicognani, E., Klimstra, T., & Goossens, L. (2014). Sense of community, identity statuses, and loneliness in adolescence: A cross-national study on Italian and Belgian youth. Journal of Community Psychology, 42, 414–432. doi:10.1002/jcop.21618.
Ernst, J. M., & Cacioppo, J. T. (1999). Lonely hearts: Psychological perspectives on loneliness. Applied and Preventive Psychology, 8, 1–22. doi:10.1016/s0962-1849(99)80008-0.
Goossens, L. (Ed.). (2015). De Leuvense Eenzaamheidsschaal voor Kinderen en Adolescenten: Handleiding [Loneliness and Aloneness Scale for Children and Adolescents: Manual]. Unpublished manuscript, Leuven, Belgium.
Heinrich, L. A., & Gullone, E. (2006). The clinical significance of loneliness: A literature review. Clinical Psychology Review, 26, 695–718. doi:10.1016/j.cpr.2006.04.002.
Hu, L., & Bentler, P. M. (1999). Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: Conventional criteria versus new alternatives. Structural Equation Modeling, 6, 1–55. doi:10.1080/10705519909540118.
Jones, W. H., Carpenter, B. N., & Quintana, D. (1985). Personality and interpersonal predictors of loneliness in two cultures. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 48, 1503–1511.
Larson, R. W. (1990). The solitary side of life: An examination of the time people spend alone from childhood to old age. Developmental Review, 10, 155–183. doi:10.1016/0273-2297(90)90008-R.
Little, R. J. A. (1988). A test of missing completely at random for multivariate data with missing values. Journal of the American Statistical Association, 83, 1198–1202. doi:10.2307/2290157.
Little, T. D., Cunningham, W. A., Shahar, G., & Widaman, K. F. (2002). To parcel or not to parcel: Exploring the question, weighing the merits. Structural Equation Modeling, 9, 151–173. doi:10.1207/S15328007sem0902_1.
Liu, J., Chen, X., Coplan, R. J., Ding, X., Zarbatany, L., & Ellis, W. (2015). Shyness and unsociability and their relations with adjustment in Chinese and Canadian children. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology,. doi:10.1177/0022022114567537.
Lykes, V. A., & Kemmelmeier, M. (2014). What predicts loneliness? Cultural difference between individualistic and collectivistic societies in Europe. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 45, 468–490. doi:10.1177/0022022113509881.
Maes, M., Klimstra, T., Van den Noortgate, W., & Goossens, L. (2015a). Factor structure and measurement invariance of a multidimensional loneliness scale: Comparisons across gender and age. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 24, 1829–1837. doi:10.1007/s10826-014-9986-4.
Maes, M., Van den Noortgate, W., & Goossens, L. (2015b). A reliability generalization study for a multidimensional loneliness scale: The Loneliness and Aloneness Scale for Children and Adolescents. European Journal of Psychological Assessment,. doi:10.1027/1015-5759/a000237.
Majorano, M., Musetti, A., Brondino, M., & Corsano, P. (2015). Loneliness, emotional autonomy and motivation for solitary behavior during adolescence. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 24, 3436–3447. doi:10.1007/s10826-015-0145-3.
Marcoen, A., Goossens, L., & Caes, P. (1987). Loneliness in pre through late adolescence: Exploring the contributions of a multidimensional approach. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 16, 561–577. doi:10.1007/bf02138821.
Muthén, L. K., & Muthén, B. O. (2007). Mplus user’s guide (4th ed.). Los Angeles, CA: Muthén & Muthén.
Nasser-Abu Alhija, F., & Wisenbaker, J. (2006). A Monte Carlo study investigating the impact of item parceling strategies on parameter estimates and their standard errors in CFA. Structural Equation Modeling, 13, 204–228. doi:10.1207/s15328007sem1302_3.
Neto, F., & Barros, J. (2000). Psychosocial concomitants of loneliness among students of Cape Verde and Portugal. Journal of Psychology, 134, 503–514. doi:10.1080/00223980009598232.
Perlman, D., & Peplau, L. A. (1981). Toward a social psychology of loneliness. In S. Duck & R. Gilmour (Eds.), Personal relationships in disorder (Vol. 3, pp. 31–56). London: Academic Press.
Qualter, P., Vanhalst, J., Harris, R. A., Van Roekel, E., Lodder, G., Bangee, M., & Verhagen, M. (2015). Loneliness across the life span. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 10, 250–264. doi:10.1177/1745691615568999.
Renshaw, P. D., & Brown, P. J. (1992). Loneliness in middle childhood. Journal of Social Psychology, 132, 545–547. doi:10.1080/00224545.1992.9924735.
Russell, D., Peplau, L. A., & Cutrona, C. E. (1980). The revised UCLA Loneliness Scale: Concurrent and discriminant validity evidence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 472–480. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.39.3.472.
Schumacker, R. E., & Lomax, R. G. (2004). A beginner’s guide to structural equation modeling (2nd ed.). New Jersey, NJ: Erlbaum.
Steenkamp, J. B. E. M., & Baumgartner, H. (1998). Assessing measurement invariance in cross-national consumer research. Journal of Consumer Research, 25, 78–107. doi:10.1086/209528.
Stickley, A., Koyanagi, A., Koposov, R., Schwab-Stone, M., & Ruchkin, V. (2014). Loneliness and health risk behaviours among Russian and U.S. adolescents: A cross-sectional study. BMC Public Health, 14, 366–377. doi:10.1186/1471-2458-14-366.
Suedfeld, P. (1982). Aloneness as a healing experience. In L. A. Peplau & D. Perlman (Eds.), Loneliness: A sourcebook of current theory, research and therapy (pp. 54–67). New York, NY: Wiley.
Tabachnick, B. G., Fidell, L. S., & Osterlind, S. J. (2001). Using multivariate statistics (5th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education.
Van de Schoot, R., Lugtig, P., & Hox, J. (2012). A checklist for testing measurement invariance. European Journal of Developmental Psychology, 9, 486–492. doi:10.1080/17405629.2012.686740.
Van de Vijver, F., & Tanzer, N. K. (2004). Bias and equivalence in cross-cultural assessment: An overview. European Review of Applied Psychology, 54, 119–135. doi:10.1016/j.erap.2003.12.004.
Van Staden, W. C., & Coetzee, K. (2010). Conceptual relations between loneliness and culture. Current Opinion in Psychiatry, 23, 524–529. doi:10.1097/YCO.0b013e32833f2ff9.
Wang, J. (2011). Subtypes of social withdrawal and adjustment in young Chinese adolescents. Paper presented at the National Science Foundation’s East Asian Pacific Summer Institute Conference, Beijing, China.
Wang, J. M. (2014). Preference for solitude, friendship support, and internalizing difficulties during early adolescence in the USA and China (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Maryland, College Park, MD.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Ethical Approval
All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Informed Consent
Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Maes, M., Wang, J.M., Van den Noortgate, W. et al. Loneliness and Attitudes Toward Being Alone in Belgian and Chinese Adolescents: Examining Measurement Invariance. J Child Fam Stud 25, 1408–1415 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-015-0336-y
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-015-0336-y