Measurement Resources

Resources to help identify and evaluate social isolation, loneliness, and social connectedness.

Screening – to identify whether a person is loneliness or isolated at one point in time. If a person is identified as being lonely or isolated, follow-up must be provided to assist the individual. Resources for follow-up are provided on our Connection Resources page.

Intervention Evaluation – to identify whether an intervention (a program, class, or workshop) impacts a participant’s loneliness, social isolation, or social connectedness over time. This is usually done by asking a series of questions prior (pre) intervention and then again after the intervention (post) to demonstrate change over the course of the intervention.

Screening Tools

These are examples of validated screening tools to identify loneliness. All screenings should include next steps when someone does identify as lonely or isolated. Resources can be found on our Connection Resources page.

The Wisconsin Coalition for Social Connection encourages the use of the UCLA 3-item tool for screening for isolation and loneliness. If you are interested in using that tool, we have provided additional resources below to assist.

Intervention Evaluation Tools

There are many tools available to evaluate an intervention to determine whether the intervention helps to reduce isolation or loneliness, or improve social connectedness. Many factors may contribute to identifying the best tool for your organization such as length, validity, cost, or others.

Commit to Connect produced Six Considerations for Outcome Evaluation of Social Engagement Programs Serving Older Adults and People with Disabilities.This document is great to look at the available tools and determine which tool is appropriate for you. Not all tools have been shown to be effective for intervention evaluation (such as the UCLA 3-item tool) so we encourage you to do additional research before utilizing the tool.

Below, we provide additional documentation on some of the tools listed in Commit to Connect’s source.

  • Campaign to End Loneliness Measurement Tool (See pages 11-13 in this document)

  • Upstream Social Isolation Risk Screener (U-SIRS) (see the tool in this webinar. This tool has been shown to be effective as both a screening tool and as an evaluation tool)

Are you doing screening or evaluation? We’d love to hear what your finding through your process! Please share a reports or findings and you could be featured on our page!