When someone starts wanting noticeably more time alone as they get older, it’s easy to worry it signals withdrawal, or something worse. Two studies that measured solitude directly, rather than assuming it’s a red flag, suggest that a growing preference for alone time is often something healthier than it looks, provided it’s actually chosen.
The clearest evidence comes from two experience-sampling studies by Jana Nikitin, Fabienne Rupprecht, and Corina Ristl, published in 2022 in the International Journal of Behavioral Development. The researchers tracked people’s real-time experience of solitude as it happened, rather than asking them to recall it later, across a combined sample spanning ages 18 to 88. Older adults reported more positively experienced everyday solitude than younger adults, better mood, higher self-esteem, and a stronger sense of social integration during the very moments they were alone. A third study in the same research, covering 323 people ages 19 to 79, found that solitude only felt good when it was self-chosen, when people felt they had genuine autonomy over being alone rather than having it imposed on them, that sense of choice fully explained why the experience felt positive. Interestingly, older adults didn’t report having more autonomy over their alone time than younger adults did, they simply seemed to have developed a better ability to cope gracefully even when solitude wasn’t fully chosen, a distinct skill rather than just more opportunity.
A second study helps show that this pattern holds up in a large sample of older adults specifically, while also revealing an important nuance. In a 2022 study by Aya Toyoshima and Takashi Kusumi, published in Innovation in Aging, the researchers surveyed 486 Japanese adults ages 65 to 80 across two studies, breaking solitude preference down into three distinct components, needing solitude, enjoying solitude, and being productive during solitude. Enjoying solitude was linked to significantly lower negative emotion, and being productive during alone time predicted higher positive mood and life satisfaction. But the researchers also found all three components of solitude preference were positively correlated with loneliness, and loneliness itself was strongly linked to worse wellbeing. Preferring solitude, in other words, isn’t automatically protective, it can travel alongside real loneliness in some people, which is exactly why the framing and motivation behind the preference matters as much as the preference itself.
Together, these two studies suggest that a growing preference for alone time with age deserves a more nuanced read than simple concern. Nikitin, Rupprecht, and Ristl’s research shows that older adults, on average, genuinely experience solitude more positively than younger adults do, and that the deciding factor is whether the alone time feels chosen. Toyoshima and Kusumi’s research shows that enjoying and using solitude productively tracks with real wellbeing benefits, while also flagging that solitude preference can sit uncomfortably close to loneliness for some people, making it worth paying attention to which one is actually driving the pattern. Between the two, more alone time with age looks like it can be either a sign of hard-won comfort with oneself, or a symptom worth checking on, and the difference comes down to whether it feels like a choice.
It’s worth being honest about what these two studies don’t establish. Nikitin, Rupprecht, and Ristl’s research relied on experience-sampling across a broad age range but a modest total sample size, and while the age pattern was consistent across their studies, it can’t fully rule out cohort differences unrelated to aging itself. Toyoshima and Kusumi’s research was conducted specifically with Japanese older adults, and cultural attitudes toward solitude and social withdrawal may shape how these patterns show up elsewhere.
Within those honest limits, the research offers a genuinely useful way to think about a loved one, or oneself, wanting more time alone with age. The question worth asking isn’t simply how much alone time someone wants, but whether it feels chosen and restorative, or whether it’s tangled up with loneliness underneath. That distinction, more than the amount of solitude itself, is what the evidence says actually matters.