# A Prospective-Longitudinal Investigation of the Biopsychosocial Predictors of Loneliness Across Adolescence in Autism and Typical Development

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIV OF MARYLAND, COLLEGE PARK · 2022 · $723,483

## Abstract

ABSTRACT
Loneliness, or the feeling of distress that accompanies perceived social disconnection, confers significant risk
for negative physical and mental health outcomes, such as chronic disease, depression, and self-harm.
Adolescence is a period of increasing loneliness and thus a critical time to identify risk and protective factors.
Adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) demonstrate higher rates of loneliness than the typical
population, making them especially vulnerable to these negative outcomes. While developmental research has
identified peer relations as risk and protective factors in typically developing (TD) populations, gaps remain in
our understanding of how peer relations relate to the development of loneliness in ASD. Thus, understanding
the mechanisms that confer risk and protection in the development of loneliness in adolescence, and whether
they differ in high-risk populations, is critical to effectively intervening and ameliorating loneliness before the
onset of significant deleterious consequences. Research in adults points to several cognitive and neural factors
associated with loneliness and social connection: social-cognitive systems, social reward systems, and
dissimilarity from others. These brain mechanisms are also atypical in ASD and posited to relate to atypical
social interaction. The current proposal will test a novel biopsychosocial model of the development of
loneliness in which these posited neural mechanisms serve as predictors in the development of loneliness via
their effects on social experiences. In our model, peer relations may confer both risk and protective factors
between social experience and the development of loneliness. We will test this model using a prospective-
longitudinal design to follow 75 ASD and 120 TD adolescents mean-matched in age and IQ, and followed
every four months for twenty months. Importantly, this project will be the first to integrate across these neural,
cognitive/affective, and behavioral levels of analysis to investigate risk and protective mechanisms in the
developmental emergence of loneliness in adolescents with TD and ASD, and to examine whether these
mechanisms differ between groups. The current proposal is innovative in its use of ecologically valid,
naturalistic, and social-interactive fMRI approaches that the PI Dr. Redcay has developed. Further, the
proposal builds on existing work from co-Is Drs. Shackman and Lemay and Consultant Dr. Silk to use
ecological momentary assessment (EMA) to obtain real-world, in-the-moment assessments of social
experiences and their effects on mood and loneliness. These contributions will be significant to the scientific
field and relevant to the strategic mission of NIMH because they will provide novel, critical missing information
on the developmental trajectory of loneliness in ASD and will identify mechanisms of risk for and protection
against loneliness outcomes. Knowledge gained from this project has direct implications for...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10318644
- **Project number:** 5R01MH125370-02
- **Recipient organization:** UNIV OF MARYLAND, COLLEGE PARK
- **Principal Investigator:** Elizabeth Redcay
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $723,483
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2020-12-15 → 2025-11-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10318644

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10318644, A Prospective-Longitudinal Investigation of the Biopsychosocial Predictors of Loneliness Across Adolescence in Autism and Typical Development (5R01MH125370-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10318644. Licensed CC0.

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