What is the difference between isolation and loneliness?
305 Answers
Last Updated: 08/30/2021 at 7:36pm
Perfect therapy for people who need help. I would like to say, I never can imagine it could be possible to heal people like that
Ta
Tania
Moderated by
Johanna Liasides, MSc, PhDc
Psychologist
I work with youth and young adults to help them improve depressive symptoms and self-esteem as well as effectively address family, relationship and peer conflicts.
Top Rated Answers
Anonymous
June 29th, 2016 12:11am
Loneliness is a complex and usually unpleasant feeling in which a person feels a strong sense of emptiness and solitude while isolation is a state of separation between persons or groups.
Isolation is when you are happy being alone, loneliness is being isolated, while wanting to feel love and support from others
There is a thin line of difference between the two i.e. choice.
Isolation is your choice, You chose it. While loneliness isn't your choice yet due to external or internal factors, you feel lonely and not like being there.
Isolation is usually sought or forced upon. Loneliness is rather experienced involuntarily without external influence.
Anonymous
April 17th, 2020 10:03pm
To me isolation is a more permanent state that loneliness. It is about feeling separate either emotionally or physically from others and completely without support. Loneliness to me is more about missing specific emotional connections that you used to have in your life. Maybe you’ve recently moved to a new city or gone to college for the first time and are away from family and friends. Maybe you and your significant other have separated, either temporarily or permanently, and you miss them. I think loneliness has a lot more to do with specific people shaped holes in your life and with remembering what it was like when they were there. Isolation I think can occur after a long period of loneliness. But it’s important to note that it doesn’t have to be that way and that both can occur at the same time. And they are both completely independent of your physical distance from other people. You could be isolated or lonely even in a room full of people.
Anonymous
April 17th, 2020 11:30am
Isolation can be defined as a time bound step which let a person separate himself from other for a period of time. Loneliness describes the lack of social bonding, lack of friends, missing friends & family and other things where a person feels he have no one to share feelings and thoughts. Loneliness isn't for some limited time. A person can feel lonely for weeks, months, years, decades maybe he remains lonely for the whole lifetime. Isolation doesn't last for whole life. People isolate themselves for many purposes. For professional reasons, for family, for getting rid of stress people isolate them.
Isolation is the willingness to be separated from society and your peers. Loneliness is the feeling that something is absent and you are actively missing it.
Isolation and loneliness are all most the same but there is a small "border" that divides them, and that border is free will.
People who are "isolated" in most cases chose to be in that state because they found the comfort in it, if its because their daily routine is stressful and they have a lot of things to and manage with people or to take responsibility on some matters and they chose to isolate themselves from society just to take a breather and to reset the body and mind for the next day.
On the other hand loneliness is not something that you chose to live by, it can just happen out of the bloom that you might feel that no one that you knew is connected with you, if its emotional or something out of interest that you had with him/her before.
We feel lonely because we think people wont understand us as how we feel and act, some cases people just don't find us interested enough to try do anything socially and that's OK.
We can't really go around and expect people to either like us and love us, if you will look back to your own childhood you also had kids that you didn't like and did not want to play with them.
In conclusion: Isolation and loneliness are the same thing yet one of them is in our control while the other is just natural.
I think one way to distinguish the difference between the two is that isolation is situational. You chose to be alone, or you were put in isolation. Loneliness is a feeling. You feel alone.
Isolation is self decided. Loneliness is a state of being. It is mental rather than physical. Isolation and loneliness create different feelings in a person.
Anonymous
June 13th, 2018 9:53am
Isolating yourself is seperating yourself from people. Loneliness is feeling sad and distressed about being by yourself and not being able to connect with others. So one is physical and the other is emotional. You can be isolated and not feel lonely, for example if you’re working on a project and you need to be alone in order to focus, you will be engaged in the project. You can be around people and still feel lonely. This can be for many reasons. Maybe you have a hard time connecting with others, like you don’t belong anywhere or don’t fit in, or you just feel misunderstood.
Isolation is the act of being alone. Loneliness is the feeling you have when you either become isolated or in a state of mind feel that way.
Isolation is an actual state of being and loneliness is a feeling of perhaps being isolated but it could mean a lot of other things like not feeling understood, included, or not feeling useful. Isolation can occur for many different causes such as drug/alcohol abuse, social anxieties, depression and other psychiatric disorders. Isolation can also be induced by the environment and the feeling of lack of safety and support
Anonymous
June 27th, 2018 7:07pm
Isolation means you get isolated like a ice for example you keep your self away from others and loneliness means that you are alone and have no one to express your emotions.
Isolation is an act of cutting yourself from socializing, whilst loneliness is a feeling where you feel like you need company of another person, you can also feel lonely while being surrounded with firends.
Isolation is being completely cut off from everything, you don’t talk to anyone, you don’t do anything. It’s basically sitting in bed all day playing video games and maybe getting up to go the the bathroom and eat. Loneliness is still doing those activities, and interacting with people, but having an emptiness because you don’t have anyone whose company you enjoy a lot to share your experience with.
Anonymous
July 4th, 2018 4:28am
Isolation is being away from everyone and everything
Loneliness is being without friends and being alone
Anonymous
July 25th, 2018 9:24pm
Isolation is a self-inflicted process of removing oneself from social interaction while loneliness is a feeling caused by multiple factors.
Anonymous
March 4th, 2018 5:49am
The difference between isolation and loneliness is you're choosing to be isolated from others even if you have friends and loneliness is even if you want friends and get socially involved to make friends but isn't possible right now.
Isolation put simply is where someone takes themselves away from a situation or a group of people or is taken away, this could be in a friendship group, in class or even isolating yourself from a family event. Isolating yourself means you have identified that you need space and are aware of this, therefore you remove yourself from the situation and distract yourself.
Loneliness is when you are in a group of people amongst friends or family and still feel like you have no one to talk to. You may physically be alone and upset or you could emotionally feel alone and feel like you have no one to turn to.
It is quite simple. Isolation is when somebody is avoiding you and tells your friends to do the same.
It is like other people want to see you all alone because perhaps you did something wrong or who knows.
Loneliness is when you feel you are all alone though you have a family, friends or maybe boyfriend / girlfriend. OR you have no one. There is no one for you whom you can talk, share your experiences, stories, ask for advices and so on.
Loneliness is much terrible than isolation. Because you can change and fix things when you're isolated, but loneliness....sometimes there's no way out.
Loneliness is part of the essential human condition. Ultimately there is nobody who can live your life for you, and nobody who can make the decision for you to live your life as authentically as you can, given the limits imposed on you by your society or your community. We can give our power over to others, and allow them to decide for us what is right or wrong... but even then, this is a choice we have made; we are ultimately responsible for our lives and the way things turn out for us. Within that, we can reach out and connect with other people; this is the only way to avoid madness! To isolate is to cut off from other people; due to fear, presumptions of superiority, experience of being hurt before... there are many reasons we might choose to do this... but it is a dangerous way to live, because it means that we forfeit the opportunity to be of service to others. Some people choose to isolate as part of a religious practice, such as deciding to be a hermit or going into retreat; this is a different type of choice with different implications as to the way in which the person sees the outside world and relates to others.
Loneliness can be described as just being alone, while isolation is deeper and means being affected emotionally by loneliness (feeling sad, anxious, etc.)
Anonymous
July 26th, 2018 10:18pm
loneliness is when you have everyone around you but you yourself are feeling empty and broken. Isolation is when you want to be away from other people and make a barrier because of that.
Isolation is something that happens when you want to be alone and you alienate yourself from others.
Loneliness is when you're alone, or you feel alone, because nobody's around, or maybe you've lost people that will never come back in your life, and that makes you feel like there's no one around you in this world.
Isolation is something you do yourself, from my personal experience, after you've been abandoned by someone you cared about a lot.
There are other reasons why you could isolate yourself: maybe you just want/need to be alone, maybe someone has disappointed you so much you don't want other people to do so, or maybe you're just having a bad moment and you require being alone.
Otherwise, you could suffer from the "Hedgehog Dilemma". By this, I mean that you're like a hedgehog, you have needles (sadness, emptiness, bad behavior or anything else you don't like about yourself) and you're scared you could hurt yourself and/or other people with them.
So, since you're scared of hurting and/or being hurt, you prefer to alienate yourself and be alone.
But worry not! Remember that isolating yourself for short periods of time could really help you if you're going through a lot, but never think that you're alone and nobody's there to help you. In your city, between your relatives, on this site, around the world... there will always be someone willing to talk to you and help you feel loved and appreciated, because that's what you deserve.
Anonymous
July 26th, 2018 11:25am
Loneliness is feeling that nobody understands you and that you are alone WHEN you are surrounded by people.
Isolation is to stay alone, and avoid meeting and talking to other people.
The difference between isolation and loneliness is the cause. Isolation is a form of bullying—the victim is avoided by bullies, and it’s subtle and hard to notice. That’s why it’s a common bullying method in schools when the bullies have a target, but don’t want to get caught. Their excuse could just be not liking the person. Loneliness is more of a personal concept. An emotion. You could be surrounded by people, but you can still feel lonely. That may be because you feel no one actually understands you. One thing isolation and loneliness have in common is the feeling that you don’t have a friend. That’s why 7 cups is here. To support you through times of isolation and loneliness. We are here for you.
Loneliness is when you want to be with others but have no option and isolation is when you choose to not to be others.
Anonymous
July 5th, 2018 11:32am
Isolation is a state of feeling alone without any friends or help. Loneliness is unhappiness caused by not having anyone to talk to or having no friends.
Anonymous
July 11th, 2018 5:24pm
Isolation is a choice of people concerned, friends, classmates, society, coworkers, family and other groups you do belong. While loneliness is the feeling of an individual like the person can never relate to someone whether alone or with someone.
Talk to an expert therapist
Very quick with responses and seems eager to get to the core of issues.
Reviewed Oct 21, 2024
Talk to Jennifer NowRelated Questions: What is the difference between isolation and loneliness?
I feel like isolating myself, but deep inside I am very lonely. What do I do? How can I be sure I am lonely? How do I stop feeling so isolated?What does it mean when you feel lonely all the time?What should I do when I feel like no one cares about me?How to feel loved and validated ?I have such a hard time making friends I feel like something is wrong with me, I've tried picking up new hobbies and being more social but I still struggle so much. Any help?How do I make friends?How do you build a chosen family?How do you cope with waves of loneliness? Like when you remember a friend who doesn't seem to want to be friends anymore, and you feel really sad even though you have other sources of support.