Social relationships and loneliness in adolescents with Learning Disabilities

Many studies in recent years have shown that adolescents with Learning Disabilities (LD) have more difficulties than typically developing adolescents in acquiring emotional independence from their family, in making friends and in forming peer networks. As a consequence they experience higher levels of loneliness associated to the separation/individuation process than their typically developing peers. The present study aims to investigate the emotional autonomy from parents of adolescents with LD, the quality of their social relationships and loneliness. The participants are 371 typically developing adolescents (TD-group) and 40 adolescents with Learning Difficulties (LD-group) aged between 11 and 19 years. The assessments administered to each participant were the Emotional Autonomy Scale [1], the Loneliness and Aloneness Scale for Children and Adolescents [2] and the Assessment of Interpersonal Relations [3]. The data showed that adolescents with LD perceived a lower level of quality in both their familiar and their social relationships, higher levels of peer-related loneliness, a more positive attitude toward aloneness and a less negative attitude toward aloneness compared to the TD-group. For both groups a correlation emerged between emotional autonomy and parent-related loneliness, whereas an association between detachment and peer-related loneliness emerged only for the TD-group. The findings indicate differences in the separation/individuation process in adolescents with LD that could have important implications for intervention programs focused on social and emotional competences.