This study aimed to explore the distinctive characteristics of loneliness in university students with high scores on the Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ). The author administered a questionnaire to 187 students and conducted statistical analysis of the results. Following this, semi-structured interviews with 13 participants selected from the questionnaire survey, phenomenological analysis of the interview data, and examination of the relationship between AQ scores and loneliness characteristics in the interviewees were carried out. The survey results demonstrated that the participants with high AQ scores were likely to report high scores on the UCLA Loneliness Scale (Version 3). The phenomenological analysis indicated that the interviewees’ experiences of loneliness could be divided into three structural types: loss, avoidance, and deviation. A synthesis of these results revealed that the interviewees with high AQ scores were prone to suffer from either deviation or severe loss and avoidance types of loneliness. These findings suggested that university students with high AQ scores may be more likely to experience these two forms of loneliness than those with average or low AQ scores.

This study aimed to clarify the relations between awareness of and attitude toward parental aging from late adolescence to early adulthood in Japan. An online survey was conducted with 800 participants aged 20-39 years, and the data were analyzed by exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. Awareness of “decline in parents’ activity” and “parents’ psychological maturation” were extracted for awareness of parental aging. Four attitudes toward parental aging were extracted: “caring about aging parents,” “sadness about parental aging,” “anxiety over parents’ old age,” and “generativity evoked by parental aging.” Structural equation modeling revealed that awareness of decline in parents’ activity was positively associated with sadness about paternal aging as well as anxiety over parents’ old age. Awareness of parents’ psychological maturation was positively associated with generativity evoked by parental aging. Additionally, awareness of parents’ psychological maturation was positively associated with caring about aging parents, except for women in their 20s and 30s regarding their fathers and mothers, respectively. These associations differed according to the type of parent-child relationship and the child’s age group.