Effects of Social Isolation and Loneliness in Children with Neurodevelopmental Disabilities: A Scoping Review

Abstract

Loneliness and social isolation have negative consequences on physical and mental health in both adult and pediatric populations. Children with neurodevelopmental disabilities (NDD) are often excluded and experience more loneliness than their typically developing peers. This scoping review aims to identify the type of studies conducted in children with NDD to determine the effects of loneliness and/or social isolation. Three electronic databases (Ovid MEDLINE, EMBASE, PsychINFO) were searched from inception until 5 February 2019. Two independent reviewers screened the citations for inclusion and extracted data from the included articles. Quantitative (i.e., frequency analysis) and qualitative analyses (i.e., content analysis) were completed. From our search, 5768 citations were screened, 29 were read in full, and 12 were included. Ten were case-control comparisons with cross-sectional assessment of various outcomes, which limited inference. Autism spectrum disorder, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and learning disorder were the most commonly studied NDD. This review showed that loneliness among children with NDD was associated with negative consequences on mental health, behaviour, and psychosocial/emotional development, with a likely long-term impact in adulthood. Lack of research in this area suggests that loneliness is not yet considered a problem in children with NDD. More studies are warranted using prospective designs and a larger sample size with a focus on the dynamic aspect of loneliness development.

Interpersonal Affective Touch in a Virtual World: Feeling the Social Presence of Others to Overcome Loneliness

“…In this view, loneliness is driven by the perceived quality of social relationships and the difficulties in feeling close and connected with social partners, which may be reflected at the neural level by the overlap between self and others' representations (Courtney and Meyer, 2020). Interestingly, feeling disconnected from others can compromise mental and physical health in both neurotypical and clinical groups (Cacioppo et al, 2006;Kwan et al, 2020) and predict the increased mortality even after adjusting for objective social isolation (Cacioppo et al, 2015).…”

“…In this view, loneliness is driven by the perceived quality of social relationships and the difficulties in feeling close and connected with social partners, which may be reflected at the neural level by the overlap between self and others’ representations ( Courtney and Meyer, 2020 ). Interestingly, feeling disconnected from others can compromise mental and physical health in both neurotypical and clinical groups ( Cacioppo et al, 2006 ; Kwan et al, 2020 ) and predict the increased mortality even after adjusting for objective social isolation ( Cacioppo et al, 2015 ). In particular, loneliness has been consistently associated with increased inflammation and higher levels of activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis, as reflected by salivary cortisol levels ( Cacioppo et al, 2000 ; Pressman et al, 2005 ) suggesting that perceived social isolation represents an important stressor for humans.…”

“…From early childhood, children with NeuroDevelopmental Disorders (NDDs) show early risk markers of atypical sensory processes, which confer cascading effects on child development, potentially marking the onset of neurodevelopmental difficulties and disorders ( Hill et al, 2012 ) and being the very first source of social disconnection. Children with NDDs are the most exposed to social exclusion, interpersonal disconnection, and loneliness, which is a predictor of mental health issues later in life ( Kwan et al, 2020 ). They frequently manifest hypo or hyper-responsiveness to tactile stimulation and avoidance or seeking behaviors toward touch ( Smirni et al, 2019 ), which has the unique power of connecting the self with the others in an indissoluble bond between touching and being touched.…”

Multimedia Interventions for Neurodiversity: Leveraging Insights from Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience to Build an Innovative Practice

“…The social and interactive facets of interventions could also protect from mental health issues by preventing loneliness. In fact, while feeling close to other people promotes well-being, feeling disconnected has been shown to compromise mental and physical health—in both neurotypical and clinical samples—thereby strengthening a feeling of neurocognitive isolation [ 47 ].…”

Clinical and Neurobiological Aspects of TAO Kinase Family in Neurodevelopmental Disorders

“…A study with a rare CNVs analysis by WGS suggested that a de novo deletion that affects TAOK3 (and PEBP1 ) may contribute to schizophrenia (Malhotra et al, 2011 ) and TAOK3 (but not PEBP1 ) was further confirmed in a GWAS analysis (Gilman et al, 2012 ), suggesting LOF of monogenic TAOK3 may contribute to NDDs, at least in schizophrenia. In another GWAS study, TAOK3 was identified as a genetic predisposition to loneliness (Abdellaoui et al, 2019 ), a status that accompanies NDDs (Kwan et al, 2020 ; Papagavriel et al, 2020 ). In addition, two independent GWAS analyses showed that TAOK3 is related to high opioid requirement for patients with advanced cancer pain (Gutteridge et al, 2018 ) and morphine requirement for postoperative pain in a retrospective pediatric day surgery population (Cook-Sather et al, 2014 ), suggesting a functional role of TAOK3 in controlling pain under certain conditions.…”