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Published in final edited form as: Int J Psychol. 2019 Jul 26;55(3):354–363. doi: 10.1002/ijop.12609

Remembrances of Parental Rejection are Associated with Loneliness as Mediated by Psychological Maladjustment in Young Bangladeshi Men but not Women

Diane L Putnick 1, Muhammad Kamal Uddin 2, Ronald P Rohner 3, Bipasha Singha 2, Ishrat Shahnaz 2
PMCID: PMC7054894  NIHMSID: NIHMS1565379  PMID: 31347709

Abstract

Loneliness is a significant public health issue that affects young adults. This investigation drew from interpersonal acceptance-rejection theory to understand how remembrances of parental rejection contributed to psychological maladjustment and loneliness in Bangladeshi college students (N = 300; 50% female). Students reported their remembrances of mothers’ and fathers’ acceptance-rejection and their current psychological maladjustment, and loneliness. Remembrances of rejection by parents in childhood were associated with psychological maladjustment (hostility/aggression, negative self-esteem, negative self-adequacy, emotional unresponsiveness, emotional instability, and negative worldview) for young adult men and women. Psychological maladjustment, in turn, was associated with feelings of loneliness in young adulthood for young men, but not women. Remembrances of parental rejection were also associated with greater hostility and aggression over and above general psychological functioning among both men and women. Findings are discussed in the context of different social and structural features of young adulthood for women and men in Bangladesh.

Keywords: Loneliness, interpersonal acceptance-rejection theory, psychological maladjustment, acceptance-rejection syndrome, gender

Young adults often suffer from feelings of loneliness, which may lead to physical and mental health problems (e.g., heart disease and suicidal ideation; Pervin & Ferdowshi, 2016; Valtorta, Kanaan, Gilbody, Ronzi, & Hanratty, 2017). Loneliness involves feeling insecure and unhappy when close personal relationships are not experienced. The origins of loneliness are not completely understood, but most researchers focus on unmet social and emotional needs, and dysfunctional social cognition (Ernst & Cacioppo, 1999). One possible origin of feelings of loneliness is perceived parental rejection and consequent psychological maladjustment.

The Expected Path From Parental Rejection Through Psychological Maladjustment to Loneliness in Adulthood

Interpersonal acceptance-rejection theory (IPARTheory) provides a strong framework for understanding how parental rejection may contribute to feelings of loneliness in young adulthood. More specifically, parental rejection has been shown to relate panculturally to a specific form of psychological maladjustment among both children and adults (Khaleque & Rohner, 2012a; Uddin, Khaleque, Aktar, & Hossain, 2014). Included in this form of maladjustment (called the acceptance-rejection syndrome in IPARTheory; Rohner, 2004) is a cluster of seven to ten personality dispositions: anxiety; insecurity; hostility, aggression, passive-aggression, and problems with the management of hostility/aggression; impaired self-esteem; impaired self-adequacy; emotional unresponsiveness; emotional instability; negative worldview; and emotional dependence or defensive independence, depending on the form, frequency, duration, and intensity of rejection. These dispositions in turn, often become associated with a fear of intimacy, heightened rejection sensitivity, depression, suicide attempts and suicide ideation, substance abuse, behavior disorder and conduct problems, and other behavioral and psychological problems (Rohner, 2019). Because of all the psychological damage resulting from the perception of parental (both maternal and paternal) rejection in childhood, IPARTheory predicts that many rejected adults will have difficulty establishing or maintaining warm, trusting, intimate relationships with others. Accordingly, they are likely to experience greater loneliness than do well-adjusted adults who had loving relationships with their parents in childhood.

These expectations were largely confirmed in a five-country study, where Rohner et al. (2019) found that psychological maladjustment did mediate the effects of remembered maternal and paternal rejection on loneliness. The authors also found no significant differences in these results across countries (Iraq, Italy, the Netherlands, Pakistan, and the United States). Some of the samples included college students, but others were community samples of adults. Hence it is important to replicate this finding in young adults in a sixth country.

Parental Rejection, Maladjustment, and Loneliness in Bangladesh

One of the major tasks of adolescence and young adulthood is building intimate relationships (Erikson, 1982), and adolescents may be at particular risk for loneliness (Laursen & Hartl, 2013). In Bangladesh, most young men and women are married by their early 20s (NIPORT, Mitra and Associates, & ICF International, 2016). Hence, among college students who tend to delay marriage relative to their peers, forming intimate adult relationships may be particularly salient. In a 25-country study of the incidence of loneliness in university students, young men and women in Bangladesh scored third highest (behind students in Egypt and Pakistan), with over 16% reporting that they were mostly lonely in the previous week (Peltzer & Pengpid, 2017). Given this high prevalence of loneliness, it is important to study the origins and processes associated with loneliness in Bangladeshi college students.

In this study, we explored the impact of remembered mother and father rejection on psychological adjustment and loneliness. Mothers and fathers have different styles of parenting (e.g., Putnick et al., 2012) and engage in different overall amounts and types of interactions with their children (e.g., Craig, 2006). However, mothers’ and fathers’ acceptance-rejection may each contribute to their children’s development in similar ways (e.g., Putnick et al., 2015). Including perceived mother and father acceptance-rejection in the study allows evaluation of the degree to which remembrances of each parent’s rejection contributes to loneliness among young adult.

The young adult’s gender may also contribute to the way in which parental acceptance-rejection influences psychological adjustment and loneliness. Sometimes men and boys are reported to experience more loneliness than women and girls, and sometimes not (see Mahon, Yarcheski, Yarcheski, Cannella, & Hanks, 2006, for a meta-analysis). Even if average levels of loneliness are similar for young adult men and women, it is possible that they are differentially affected by parental rejection (Ali, Khaleque, & Rohner, 2015; Rohner, 2008). Furthermore, there are striking gender differences in conventions for social relationships among young adult men and women in Bangladesh. For example, men marry an average of 7 years later than women (United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division, 2013), and unmarried women (even college students) often reside with their parents. These social and structural differences may change the dynamics among parental rejection, psychological maladjustment, and loneliness.

Context of the Present Study

The purpose of the present study was to replicate previous findings that remembrances of parental rejection in childhood are associated with current psychological maladjustment, and that maladjustment, in turn, is associated with loneliness in Bangladeshi young adults. As noted earlier, we expected psychological maladjustment to mediate the link between perceived maternal and paternal rejection and loneliness. Additionally, we explored remembrances of both mother and father rejection to determine whether they have similar effects. Because we were unable to find any studies related to gender moderating the relations between Bangladeshi college students’ feelings about their parents and their psychological maladjustment and loneliness, we made no specific hypotheses about the moderating effects of young adults’ gender.

Method

Participants

Altogether 300 young adults (50% female) between 18 and 28 years of age (M = 21.54, SD = 1.81) participated in the study. All participants were students at a University in Bangladesh – 16% first year, 24% second year, 27% third year, 24% fourth year, and 9% Masters students. Most were unmarried (92%) and came from nuclear families (84%). Mothers’ education was wide ranging – from illiterate (7%), class 1–5 (11%), class 6–10 (17%), Secondary School Certificate (SSC; 29%), Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC; 17%), Bachelor (13%), and Masters (7%). Fathers’ education ranged from illiterate (3%), class 1–5 (6%), class 6–10 (11%), SSC (14%), HSC (19%), Bachelor (22%), and Masters (25%).

Procedures

Students were given five self-report questionnaires in the following order: Adult version of the Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire-Short Form for mothers (Adult PARQ: Mother), Adult Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire-Short Form for fathers (Adult PARQ: Father), Adult version of the Personality Assessment Questionnaire-Short Form (Adult PAQ), Interpersonal Acceptance-Rejection Loneliness Scale (IPARLS), and the Personal Information Form (PIF). The PIF (Rohner, 2005a) was used to gather sociodemographic information such as age, gender, marital status, and parental education. All questionnaires were translated into Bangla language by two bilingual Bangladeshi researchers. Because it was never used in Bangladesh before, the translated IPARLS was pilot tested on 30 adults (17 males and 13 females) to assess reliability, and to identify any translation or interpretation issues; internal consistency was good (α = .79), and no translation issues were found. Participants completed informed consent prior to engaging in the study, and human subjects protection was consistent with the ethical principles mandated in the Declaration of Helsinki (World Medical Association, 2013).

Measures

Adult Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire (PARQ): Mother and Father.

The short forms of these self-report measures (Rohner, 2005b) consist of 24 items each. They are designed to measure individuals’ remembrances of maternal and paternal acceptance or rejection. The mother and father versions are identical except for reference to mothers’ behavior versus fathers’ behavior. In both, adults are asked to reflect on their remembrances of their mothers’ or fathers’ behaviors toward them when the respondents were children growing up at home. Items on the PARQ are scored on a 4-point Likert scale, with 1 (almost never true), 2 (rarely true), 3 (sometimes true), and 4 (almost always true). Both measures consist of four summed scales: (a) a 6-item Hostility/Aggression scale (e.g., “My mother [father] nagged or scolded me when I was bad”), (b) a 4-item Undifferentiated Rejection scale (e.g., “My mother [father] did not really love me”), (c) a 6-item Indifference/Neglect scale (e.g., “My mother [father] paid no attention to me”), and (d) an 8-item Warmth/Affection scale (e.g., “My mother [father] said nice things about me). The latter scale was reverse-scored to indicate Coldness/Lack of Affection. Extensive evidence in Khaleque and Rohner (2002), Rohner (2005b), and Rohner and Ali (2016a) shows the Adult PARQ to be a reliable and valid measure for use in the United States and internationally. Internal consistency for individual scales in this study ranged from .58 to .73 for mothers and .65 to .83 for fathers.

Adult Personality Assessment Questionnaire (PAQ).

The Adult PAQ, short form (Rohner & Khaleque, 2005) is a self-report measure assessing psychological adjustment of the form described in the acceptance-rejection syndrome noted earlier. The measure consists of 42 items divided into seven 6-item summed scales: (a) hostility/aggression (e.g., “I think about fighting or being unkind”), (b) dependence (e.g., “I like my friends to feel sorry for me when I feel ill”), (c) negative self-esteem (e.g., “I like myself” - reversed), (d) negative self-adequacy (e.g., “I feel I can do the things I want as well as most people” - reversed), (e) emotional unresponsiveness (e.g., “I have difficulty showing people how I really feel”), (f) emotional instability (e.g., “I get upset when things go wrong”), and (g) negative worldview (e.g., “I see life as full of dangers”). Items are scored on a 4-point Likert scale: 1 (almost never true), 2 (rarely true), 3 (sometimes true), and 4 (almost always true). Higher scores on all scales indicate less positive psychological adjustment. Extensive evidence reported in Khaleque and Rohner (2002), Rohner and Ali (2016b), and Rohner and Khaleque (2005) shows the PAQ to be reliable and valid for research in the United States and cross-culturally. Internal consistency for individual scales in this study ranged from .51 to .77

Interpersonal Acceptance-Rejection Loneliness Scale (IPARLS).

The IPARLS (Rohner & Molaver, 2015) is a newly developed self-report measure used in a five-nation, multicultural study for the first time in Rohner et al. (2019). Fifteen items measure feelings of sadness resulting from the absence of and longing for desired companionship, or as a result of separation from a wanted relationship (e.g., “I feel unhappy because I am left out”, “I wish I had more friends”). Items are scored on a 5-point Likert scale from (1) almost never true through (5) almost always true. A total score is computed as the sum of the 15 items; higher scores represent more loneliness. Coefficient alpha in the initial validation study of the measure (Molaver, 2016) yielded a value of .96, and alphas in the five-nation study ranged from .86 to .96 (Rohner et al., 2019). Internal consistency in this sample was .86.

Preliminary Analyses and Analytic Plan

Descriptive statistics and intercorrelations of all variables were explored to inform the models. As is common in research with community samples, the PARQ scales were positively skewed (e.g., indicating that most parents were rated as low in rejection, with fewer ranging into the higher levels of rejection). To assess the impact of remembered parental acceptance-rejection on feelings of loneliness—as mediated through psychological maladjustment—we fit a series of structural equation models using Mplus 8 (Muthén & Muthén, 2017), and robust maximum likelihood (MLR) estimation which provides the robust Satorra-Bentler χ2. Models were considered to have good fit if the χ2 test was nonsignificant (p > .05), the CFI and TLI ≥ .95, the RMSEA ≤ .06, and the SRMR ≤ .08 (Hu & Bentler, 1999). The MLR estimator was used because it is robust to non-normality of the PARQ scales. However, greater weight was given to the incremental/approximate fit indices than to the significance of the χ2 because the χ2 value is known to be sensitive to sample size (Cheung & Rensvold, 2002).

Analyses were conducted in three steps. First, measurement models of the mother and father PARQ (tested together), and the PAQ were fit to model the shared variance between subscales (Table 1). Second, two a priori models were tested with (1) the mother and father PARQ latent variables from the measurement model directly predicting the IPARLS loneliness scale, and (2) the mother and father PARQ latent variables predicting the the PAQ latent variable from the measurement model, which in turn predicted the IPARLS loneliness scale. Indirect effects of mother and father PARQ to IPARLS assessed mediation through the PAQ. Third, to assess moderation of the full mediation model across genders, multiple-group models were tested across women and men. Additional details about each step in the analysis are presented in the Supplementary Information.

Table 1.

Correlations Among Constructs, and Descriptive Statistics

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Mother Rejection
1. Hostility/ Aggression 1
2. Undifferentiated Rejection .66*** 1
3. Indifference/ Neglect .61*** .66*** 1
4. Coldness .40*** .38*** .39*** 1
Father Rejection
5. Hostility/ Aggression .55*** .49*** .51*** .29*** 1
6. Undifferentiated Rejection .53*** .56*** .48*** .34*** .75*** 1
7. Indifference/ Neglect .51*** .52*** .58*** .32*** .69*** .72*** 1
8. Coldness .15* .18** .19*** .46*** .37*** .34*** .30*** 1
Psychological Maladjustment
9. Hostility/ Aggression .51*** .52*** .52*** .32*** .55*** .57*** .57*** .19*** 1
10. Dependency .17** .12* .05 −.04 .13* .13* .10 −.09 .22*** 1
11. Negative Self-Esteem .27*** .23*** .27*** .26*** .33*** .26*** .32*** .29*** .37*** −.07 1
12. Negative Adequacy .13* .08 .11 .18** .20*** .18** .17** .24*** .29*** .01 .56*** 1
13. Emotional Unresponsiveness .20*** .20*** .20*** .26*** .24*** .25*** .24*** .31*** .30*** −.06 .50*** .42*** 1
14. Emotional Instability .21*** .14* .17** .15** .33*** .26*** .30*** .23*** .49*** .15** .37*** .45*** .29*** 1
15. Negative Worldview .28*** .26*** .26*** .29*** .27*** .29*** .34*** .32*** .41*** .02 .56*** .51*** .45*** .37*** 1
Loneliness
16. Total Loneliness .04 .07 .11 .09 .13* .13* .15* .15* .14* .25*** .14* .18** .17** .11 .17** 1
M 11.40 6.35 11.92 12.67 11.28 6.73 12.10 13.68 12.98 16.79 12.30 13.65 13.28 16.00 11.90 35.64
SD 3.76 2.58 3.22 3.85 4.33 3.07 3.61 4.93 3.77 3.79 3.28 2.99 2.98 3.24 4.04 11.04
Range 6–22 4–16 6–23 8–29 6–23 4–16 6–23 8–30 6–23 6–24 6–24 6–23 6–24 7–24 6–24 15–69
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*

p < .05.

**

p < .01.

***

p < .001.

Results

Descriptive Statistics and Correlations

Table 1 displays sample descriptive statistics. On average, Bangladeshi adults remember their parents to have been relatively low on rejection. Adults also tended to report fairly positive levels of psychological adjustment, and only low levels of loneliness—all of which tended to reflect the low-risk university sample. Young men rated their mothers and fathers as higher in hostility/aggression, undifferentiated rejection, and indifference/neglect than did young women, Fs(1, 298) = 8.44 to 38.42, ps = .004 to < .001, η2 = .028 to .114, but the two groups were similar in coldness, Fs(1, 298) = 2.87 and .06, ps = .091 and .800, η2s < .010. Young men also rated themselves as higher in hostility/aggression, F(1, 298) = 20.33, p < .001, η2 = .064, emotional unresponsiveness, F(1, 298) = 4.38, p = .037, η2 = .014, and loneliness, F(1, 298) = 6.52, p = .011, η2 = .021, than did young women. The young men also rated themselves as being lower in emotional instability, F(1, 298) = 5.44, p = .020, η2 = .018, than did young women, but the two groups were similar in all other areas of psychological maladjustment, Fs(1, 298) = .17 to 1.82, ps > .05, η2s < .010.

Intercorrelations in Table 1 show strong relations among the four acceptance-rejection (PARQ) mother scales, and the four PARQ father scales—suggesting that they could be modeled as single factors of mother and father rejection, respectively. Furthermore, correlations between matching mother and father scales were medium to large, suggesting that like-scales may share additional variance. All psychological maladjustment (PAQ) scales had medium to large intercorrelations except for the dependency scale, which had small and sometimes negative relations with other PAQ scales. Loneliness was significantly related to all mother and father PARQ scales as well as all PAQ scales.

Measurement Models

Measurement models were tested for (1) the mother and father PARQs, and for (2) the PAQ. The mother and father PARQ factors were related .76, so we fit a model with a higher-order factor representing parental rejection (see Supplementary Figure S1). To improve model fit, we also added 2 residual covariances between mother and father indifference/neglect and mother and father coldness. All PARQ scales loaded significantly on their latent factors.

In the PAQ measurement model, the dependency scale did not load significantly on the factor, so this scale was dropped. In addition, two residual covariances were added to the model to achieve acceptable model fit. All remaining PAQ scales loaded significantly on the latent factor (see Supplementary Figure S2).

Measurement models were tested across genders. The PARQ model was partially invariant across gender (requiring 1 released loading for mothers and 1 released loading for fathers); the PAQ model was fully invariant across genders. Additional details about measurement models are presented in Supplementary Information.

Structural Models

The model of parental PARQ directly predicting the IPARLS loneliness scale depicted in Figure 1A had good fit, χ2(24) = 31.25, p = .147. CFI = .99. TLI = .99. RMSEA = .03, 90%CI = .00 – .06. SRMR = .03. Young adults’ remembrances of parental rejection in childhood was only marginally related to feelings of loneliness (p < .10).

Figure 1.

Figure 1.

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Direct effects (1A) of parental rejection on feelings of loneliness, and indirect effects (1B) through psychological functioning. All coefficients are significant at p < .001 unless otherwise noted. Dashed paths were added to the a priori model.

When we added psychological functioning to the model as a mediator between remembrances of parental rejection and loneliness, the model did not fit the data, χ2(82) = 213.58, p < .001, CFI = .93, TLI = .90, RMSEA = .07, 90%CI = .06 – .09, SRMR = .08. Modification indices suggested that remembrances of parental rejection shared additional variance with PAQ hostility that was not accounted for by the association between parental rejection and total PAQ. Hence, over and above the relation with total psychological functioning, remembering parents as having been rejecting was associated with greater hostility and aggression. Adding this path to the model, the full mediation model depicted in Figure 1B fit the data, χ2(81) = 114.00, p = .009, CFI = .98, TLI = .98, RMSEA = .04, 90%CI = .02 – .05, SRMR = .05. In this model, remembrances of parental rejection significantly predicted psychological maladjustment and hostility/aggression in particular. In turn, general psychological maladjustment predicted feelings of loneliness. The indirect effect of parental rejection on feelings of loneliness through psychological maladjustment was small but significant, β = .098, p = .022, suggesting that psychological maladjustment mediates the relation between remembered parental rejection and loneliness. Separate alternative models for mother and father acceptance rejection are presented in the Supplementary Information. Results for separate models were nearly identical to the combined model.

Moderation by Gender

The models in Figure 1A and Figure 1B were tested for moderation across gender (males, n = 151; and females, n = 149). After carrying over the fully or partially constrained factors from the measurement models (see Supplementary Information), the structural paths in Figure 1A were fully invariant across genders, Δχ2(5) = 7.17, p = .209, ΔCFI = .003, but the structural paths in Figure 1B were not fully invariant across genders, Δχ2(14) = 31.92, p = .004, ΔCFI = .012. Modification indices indicated that the path from total maladjustment (PAQ) to loneliness was different among males (β = .38, p < .001) from what it was among females (β = −.03, p = .810). Releasing this path resulted in an acceptable change in model fit, Δχ2(13) = 22.38, p = .050, ΔCFI = .006. Furthermore, the indirect effects of remembered parental rejection on loneliness through psychological maladjustment were significant only for males, β = .14, p < .001, but not for females, β = −.02, p = .811.

Discussion

Results of this study indicate that remembrances of rejection by one’s parents in childhood are associated with psychological maladjustment in adulthood among both young adult Bangladeshi men and women. Psychological maladjustment, in turn, is associated with feelings of loneliness in young adulthood for men, but not women. Remembrances of rejection by one’s parents in childhood were also associated with greater hostility and aggression over and above general psychological functioning among both young men and women.

This study partially replicated findings reported by Rohner et al. (2019). Young adults’ perceptions of maternal and paternal rejection were very highly correlated in this sample, resulting in little differentiation between rejection from mothers and fathers. Consequently, parental rejection was modeled as a single factor rather than as separate but correlated factors (as in Rohner et al., 2019). In a sample of Bangladeshi children, Uddin, Khaleque, Aktar, and Hossain (2014) found a correlation of .64 between perceived maternal and paternal acceptance. The use of a latent variable framework in this investigation removed measurement error, which may have (appropriately) inflated the correlation between remembrances of mother and father rejection. It remains to be determined whether Bangladeshi parents behave very similarly, or whether their children simply remember their parenting as being more similar than in other samples.

Consistent with IPARTheory’s universalist perspective (e.g., Khaleque & Rohner, 2012a), parental rejection was related to psychological maladjustment for both men and women. However, remembered parental rejection was only marginally directly associated with loneliness, and psychological functioning mediated the relation between remembered parental rejection and loneliness for young adult men but not women. Compared to young women, young men felt more rejected by their parents and more lonely, but these mean differences were small in size. In comparison to men, young Bangladeshi women tend to experience more social support, which helps protect them from the adverse effects of remembered rejection and psychological maladjustment on feelings of loneliness. Mattanah and colleagues (2011) reported that relations between parenting attachment and college student adjustment were stronger when students lived away from home. We did not have specific information in this study about where students lived, but normatively more Bangladeshi women than men live at home with their parents until they are married. Young Bangladeshi women also tend to maintain close, emotionally responsive relationships with family and friends whereas men are often discouraged from being emotionally expressive. Rather, men are encouraged to be independent and assertive (Islam & Akter, 2018).

Such culturally normative gender-role differences in this patriarchal society may help explain why young Bangladeshi men report more loneliness than do women. This could help explain why remembered parental rejection is less influential for young women’s loneliness than it is for men.

One unexpected finding in this study was that remembered parental rejection had a direct relation with hostility/aggression over and above the relation with general psychological maladjustment. Previous studies support the link between parental rejection and child hostility/aggression (Khaleque & Rohner, 2012b), but this is the first time (to our knowledge) that a unique relation has been found, after accounting for overall psychological adjustment. One possible explanation for this finding could be that parental rejection is accompanied by frequent corporal punishment in Bangladesh (UNICEF, 2008), which has well-documented links with child hostility and aggression (Alampay et al., 2017). Supporting this idea, Uddin (2013) found a positive correlation between parental rejection and harshness of corporal punishment in Bangladeshi adolescents.

Strengths, Limitations, and Future Directions

This study had several advantages and disadvantages that should be noted. For example, the sample size was large, providing adequate power to detect small effects. However, even though well-validated measures were used, the internal consistency of some scales was low. Offsetting this limitation, the individual PARQ and PAQ scales were modeled as latent variables, which relegates measurement error to their residual terms. Other disadvantages were that all data were self-reported at a single time point. The self-report nature of the questionnaires may have inflated relations because of shared source and method variance. In the future, different reporters and methods should be used to control for source/method bias. Future research should also confirm these relations longitudinally in prospective studies. Further research should also explore how residential, marital, betrothal (e.g., in the case of pre-arranged marriages), or partnership status may moderate the results. This study suggests that young men in particular may need additional support to offset feelings of loneliness.

In Bangladesh, college students generally delay marriage compared to their non-college peers. In this study, for example, fewer than 10% of students were married. This delay in marriage may contribute to feelings of loneliness. Young men and women who experienced parental rejection as children may struggle to maintain supportive family relationships while also struggling to initiate close relationships with friends and partners. Finally, future research should explore reasons why young Bangladeshi women’s psychological functioning is not tied to feelings of loneliness, and what additional factors predict their loneliness.

Implications and Conclusions

Loneliness has implications for psychological and physical well-being (Heinrich & Gullone, 2006; Valtorta et al., 2016). Although loneliness normatively decreases slightly in late adolescence, some young adults maintain high levels of loneliness across this period and experience higher depression and anxiety, and lower self-esteem compared to their non-lonely peers (Vanhalst et al., 2013). Understanding the origins of loneliness in childhood could help practitioners find new ways to alleviate it. Mann and colleagues (2017) categorized loneliness interventions into 4 categories targeting (1) cognitions, (2) social skills and psychoeducation, (3) supported socialization, and (4) community groups. A successful intervention for lonely college students in Bangladesh will need to consider their social structures and restrictions. For example, many Bangladeshi regard it as inappropriate for unmarried men and women to develop intimate heterosexual friendships, so interventions will need to focus on other methods to build support. Our study suggests that interventions for young adult Bangladeshi men that focus on cognitive strategies for coping with parental rejection may have cascading effects on improving psychological functioning and reducing feelings of loneliness.

Supplementary Material

Supplementary Information

Acknowledgements:

We thank the young adults who participated in this research.

Funding:

Diane L. Putnick is supported by the Intramural Program of the NIH, NICHD.

Footnotes

Compliance with Ethical Standards:

All procedures performed in this study were in accordance with the ethical standards of the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments.

Conflicts of Interest:

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Informed Consent:

Informed consent was obtained from all individual adult participants included in the study.

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