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Innov Aging
Innov Aging
innovateage
Innovation in Aging
2399-5300 Oxford University Press US 

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.2061
igaa057.2061
Abstracts
Session 5690 (Symposium)
AcademicSubjects/SOC02600
Early-Life Circumstances and Late-Life Loneliness: Findings From In-Depth Interviews
Tiilikainen Elisa  
University of Eastern Finland, Kuopio, Finland
2020 
16 12 2020 
16 12 2020 
4 Suppl 1 Program Abstracts from The GSA 2020 Annual Scientific Meeting “Turning 75: Why Age Matters”609 609
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America.2020This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Abstract
This case study examines loneliness from the perspective of two older men, who were interviewed three times as part of a five-year qualitative longitudinal study on loneliness in later life. Both interviewees self-identified as feeling lonely “often” or “all the time” and had experienced loneliness also in previous life phases. The interviews revealed trajectories of long-term loneliness which were impacted by life events and circumstances in early life, childhood and youth. Two critical experiences were identified: childhood bereavement and sexual abuse. These factors contributed to emotional insecurities and impacted the ways the interviewees perceived their selves and their relations with others. The acknowledgement of past life experiences is important for the theoretical and conceptual understanding of loneliness and the development of different intervention strategies. However, more longitudinal analysis is needed on the cumulative disadvantages making people vulnerable to long-term loneliness.