Physical Impairments Disrupt the Association Between Physical Activity and Loneliness: A Longitudinal Study.

This study explores the association between physical activity (PA), loneliness, and the presence of physical chronic impairments among single older adults. A longitudinal study ( = 575; mean age 76 ± 8 years) was conducted. The association between self-reported weekly minutes of moderate to vigorous PA, loneliness, and presence of physical impairments was assessed with multilevel analyses at baseline, 3 months, and 6 months. Improvements in moderate to vigorous PA were associated with decreases in loneliness ( = -0.09,  = 0.04,  = .020); this association became nonsignificant when including the presence of physical impairments in the analyses ( = .824), which in itself was positively associated with loneliness ( = 0.51,  = 0.10,  < .001). Findings indicate that physical impairments have a larger influence on loneliness than the level of PA. Interventions targeting PA and loneliness should tailor specifically to physical impairments.