Benjamin H. Gottlieb

Social support concepts and measures.

Distinctions among concepts and approaches to assessing social support are made, and published generic and specialized measures of social support are reviewed. Depending on study aims, investigators may be interested in assessing perceived or received support from the perspective of the provider, the recipient, or both. Whereas some measures inquire about the availability or mobilization of several kinds of supportive resources, others seek supplemental information about the membership and structural properties of the social network as well. Observational and self-reported measures of support are presented, along with brief and extensive measures. A final set of three support measures is highlighted, including their psychometric properties.

Social Networks and Social Support: An Overview of Research, Practice, and Policy Implications

Following a brief overview of the stressful life events-illness model and its implications for intervention, this article highlights the role of social support as a resource for resisting stress- induced illness and disability. It identifies three different connotative meanings that have been assigned to the social support construct, and describes their empirical operationalizations in several recent studies. Specifically, the social integration/participation formulation, the social network approach, and the social intimacy measurement strategy are described and contrasted. Within the latter approach, one study that illuminated types of informal helping behaviors is discussed in greater detail. A review of possible mechanisms whereby social support accom plishes its health-protective impact is also offered, and two types of planned interventions involving the mobilization or optimization of social support are spotlighted. The article concludes with ideas about ways that professionals can safeguard the natural helping skills of citizens and achieve an appropriate balance between formal and informal systems of service delivery in the health and human services fields.

Conceptual and Measurement Issues in the Study of Coping with Chronic Stress

Systematic research on the subject of coping with chronic stress is long overdue. Compared to the voluminous literature that examines responses to acute or short-term stressful events and transitions that have clearly demarcated time spans, the behavioral and emotional regulatory processes that unfold in circumstances of unremitting demand have been understudied. For example, how do people deal with the ongoing threat of neighborhood violence or crime? How do family members come to terms with and learn to manage the long-term disability that results from a spinal cord injury or the uncertainty that arises in the wake of a heart attack or stroke? Are there certain psychological devices that assist recently divorced partners to preserve or restore their sense of self-worth? Are there daily routines and patterns of social interaction that help people maintain their equilibrium in the face of persistent life strains that involve balancing multiple and frequently conflicting social roles?

Stress and Support Processes in Close Relationships

To date, our understanding of social support has relied more strongly on people’s reports of the resources they could gain from their social networks than on the study of their stress-related transactions. The measures of social support that have achieved the most popularity (Cohen et al., 1985; Procidano & Heller, 1983; Sarason et al., 1983) gauge the psychological sense of support that people develop but leave obscure how their experiences in particular relationships affect their receipt and provision of support. As Pearlin and McCall (1990) observe, “the social and interactional character of support has either been ignored altogether or largely taken for granted.” By treating social support as a dynamic process that unfolds in particular relationships and situations, we can identify some of the contingencies governing its expression and thereby learn more about the conditions under which its protective effect is conferred (Rutter, 1987). Equally important, such a process-oriented approach can offer instruction about the circumstances in which social support miscarries.

Types and Precipitants of Growth and Decline in Emerging Adulthood

To further explore central developmental themes of emerging adulthood, the authors conducted a study that combines qualitative and quantitative data about the types of personal growth and decline reported by a sample of emerging adults, who also described the life events and other experiences that brought about these personal changes. After completing a 42-item inventory of types of growth and decline, participants wrote descriptions of the life events and other experiences to which they attributed these personal changes. At least 50% of the participants reported growth in the relating to others, new possibilities, and personal strength domains. Their descriptive accounts attributed the growth largely to eventful experiences associated with their recent transition to university and to events involving the participants’ close social networks. The discussion centers on the study’s contribution to our understanding of development in emerging adulthood.

Using social support to protect and promote health.

This article begins with an explanation of social supports preventive functions as a resource for averting and resisting stress and as a general contributor to health and morale. Next, it presents a variety of emergent interventions involving the mobilization and augmentation of social support, one set classified as health protection (secondary prevention) approaches and the other as health enhancement (primary prevention) approaches. The article concludes with suggestions for future research aimed to improve the conduct and impact of these interventions.

Social support groups among new parents: An experimental study in primary prevention

Abstract This paper reports the findings of an action‐research project aimed at assessing the health‐protective effects and social consequences arising from the creation of social support groups among new parents. The study was designed and implemented in collaboration with two family physicians and adopted an experimental design whereby new parents from each physicians files were randomly assigned to a “treatment”; (social support) group and a “control”; (written educational materials only) group. The 24 couples comprising the sample completed questionnaires inquiring about their use of informal social support, their levels of stress and well‐being and their perceptions of their own parenting role before attending the group sessions and five weeks after the final session. Analysis ofcovariance revealed that the intervention prompted couples to increase their use of informal resources in their own social networks, while it did not alter levels of stress or well‐being. The discussion centers on methodolog...

Theory into Practice: Issues That Surface in Planning Interventions Which Mobilize Support

This paper addresses two sets of issues that have cropped up in the planning of intervention programs that mobilize or improve the social support available to vulnerable populations in the community. The first set of issues emerged in the process of planning the design of a supportive intervention for adolescents whose parents had recently separated or divorced. I was faced with the practical matter of deciding exactly what kinds and sources of support would most appropriately meet the needs of youth facing this family disruption, a decision which ultimately entailed an analysis of the best match between the several stressful demands surrounding this life event and the supportive provisions that different people could marshall on behalf of these youth. In particular, I debated the virtues of an intervention involving their participation in a peer group context as opposed to one emphasizing their involvement with a single close associate or confidant. The considerations surrounding this practical decision proved highly instructive because they spotlight issues that practitioners must confront in planning appropriate support-mobilizing interventions among other client populations.

The Physical Activity Scale for the Elderly (PASE) Questionnaire; Does It Predict Physical Health?

A lack of physical activity is common in older adults. With the increasing Canadian senior population, identifying the minimum amount of physical activity required to maintain the health of older adults is essential. This study determined whether relationships existed between the Physical Activity Scale for the Elderly (PASE) questionnaire scores and health-related measurements in community-dwelling older adults who were meal delivery volunteers. Based on observed relationships between PASE scores and health parameters, the study attempted to predict an optimal PASE score that would ensure health parameters fell in desired ranges for older adults. 297 community-dwelling older adults (61.3% female) 60–88 years (72.1 ± 6.5) completed the PASE and were measured for body composition, cardiovascular and blood parameters, flexibility, and handgrip strength. Significant regression models using PASE were produced for the health-related measures, but the relationships were not meaningful due to low predictive capacity. However, correlational data suggested that a minimum PASE score of ~140 for males and ~120 for females predicted a favorable waist circumference. In conclusion, findings demonstrated that PASE scores cannot be used to predict healthy physical measures, although the relationships between PASE and WC could be used to encourage older adults to become more physically active.

The primary group as supportive milieu: applications to community psychology.

The paper reviews evidence documenting the health-protective effects of the informal social support extended by kith, kin, and community gatekeepers. Noteworthy features of a classification scheme describing the substance of informal helping behaviors are reviewed. Implications for future research and action address: (a) the need for professionals to reexamine occasions for the provision of consultation and crisis-intervention services; (b) the potential for using social network analysis to identify vulnerable groups in the community; (c) the merits of advocating on behalf of informal support systems as favorable settings for the accomplishment of primary prevention.