Wonkhe SUs · The 2026 webinar box set
Friends have benefits
Tackling loneliness and belonging in higher education.
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We diagnose loneliness and belonging – who is most affected, when and why – and take apart the belonging headline that hides three different things, and the more than four in ten students who say they belong but are lonely anyway. We look at how different kinds of friendship do different jobs, why anxiety is the bridge that opportunity alone won't cross, and how universities and SUs can jointly build a programme-level "home", drawing on Salford and European models. With Ed Moloney, CEO, University of Salford Students' Union
What we cover
- Diagnosing loneliness and belonging – who is loneliest, when and why, with disabled and international students among the hardest hit.
- Why it's academic, not pastoral – belonging as one of the strongest predictors of continuation, feeding OfS B3 and Risk 7.
- The belonging headline is lying – one number standing in for three different things.
- Belonging is three things – close friendship, a place at the institution, and academic citizenship.
- More than four in ten belong but are lonely – the group a belonging score can't see.
- Three kinds of friend, three jobs – friends in your subject, friends across the uni, and friends in life generally, each doing something different.
- Anxiety is the bridge – why opportunity at the front door won't reach the students who have nobody to go with.
- The UK has the routes, but scattered – four channels on separate tracks, versus Europe's bundled subject-level home.
- European models – Finland's student tutors, KTH's chapters, and welcome that runs to Christmas, not week one.
- Building it jointly – Salford's four I's, and a subject-level home neither the SU nor the university can deliver alone.
Things to read
- Friends, it turns out, have benefits
- What does student belonging really mean and what really drives it?
- Efforts to build belonging may get the problem the wrong way around
- The one where they still don't have any friends
- Student loneliness isn't going away and the evidence on what works is getting stronger
- What's in APPs on belonging and social connection?
- What SUs need to know about a new book on belonging
- 100 ways to build (and bridge) community on campus
- Belonging and retention: what does the evidence tell us?
- Here's what part-time, distance learner and commuter students need their SU to focus on
- Understanding loneliness stigma
- Peer support builds connection, community and confidence
- What type of interventions best address student loneliness?
- Over a quarter of students have no friends at university
- The four foundations of belonging at university
- Anxious students are more likely to struggle both socially and academically
- Some new findings on students and belonging
- How important are friends at university to student mental health?
- How to tackle student loneliness before term starts
- Only the lonely – loneliness, student activities and mental wellbeing
- All Wonkhe SUs explainers on belonging
- All Wonkhe articles tagged belonging
- All Wonkhe articles tagged students