A meta-analysis on the social relationship outcome of being compassionate towards oneself: The moderating role of individualism-collectivism

Self-compassion could benefit social relationships. However, its effect size and cross-cultural consistency have not been reviewed. This meta-analysis synthesized the effect sizes of the correlations between self-compassion and social relationship outcomes and examined the moderating role of individualism-collectivism on this link. Results indicated that self-compassion was positively correlated with perceived social support with a moderate effect size (r = 0.31, N = 6056), negatively correlated with loneliness with a moderate-to-large effect size (r = −0.41, N = 3295), and positively correlated with close relationship quality with a small effect size (r = 0.17, N = 4262). The positive link between self-compassion and social support and the negative one of loneliness were weaker in samples collected from more collective societies. The implications were discussed.