Associations of Pain Intensity and Frequency With Loneliness, Hostility, and Social Functioning: Cross-Sectional, Longitudinal, and Within-Person Relationships

Ian A. Boggero, John A. Sturgeon, Anne Arewasikporn, Saul A. Castro, Christopher D. King, Suzanne C. Segerstrom

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

13 Scopus citations

Abstract

Background: The current studies investigated associations between pain intensity and pain frequency with loneliness, hostility, and social functioning using cross-sectional, longitudinal, and within-person data from community-dwelling adults with varying levels of pain. Method: Secondary analysis of preexisting data was conducted. Study 1 investigated cross-sectional (baseline data: n = 741) and longitudinal (follow-up data: n = 549, observed range between baseline and follow-up: 6–53 months) associations. Study 2 tested within-person associations using daily diaries across 30 days from a subset of the participants in Study 1 (n = 69). Results: Cross-sectionally, pain intensity and frequency were associated with higher loneliness (β intensity = 0.16, β frequency = 0.17) and worse social functioning (β intensity = − 0.40, β frequency = − 0.34). Intensity was also associated with higher hostility (β = 0.11). Longitudinally, pain intensity at baseline predicted hostility (β = 0.19) and social functioning (β = − 0.20) at follow-up, whereas pain frequency only predicted social functioning (β = − 0.21). Within people, participants reported higher hostility (γ = 0.002) and worse social functioning (γ = − 0.013) on days with higher pain, and a significant average pain by daily pain interaction was found for loneliness. Pain intensity did not predict social well-being variables on the following day. Conclusion: Pain intensity and frequency were associated with social well-being, although the effects were dependent on the social well-being outcome and the time course being examined.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)217-229
Number of pages13
JournalInternational Journal of Behavioral Medicine
Volume26
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 15 2019

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, International Society of Behavioral Medicine.

Keywords

  • Acute pain
  • Biopsychosocial
  • Community-dwelling adults
  • Social well-being

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Applied Psychology

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