TY - JOUR
T1 - Assessing social support as a prevention resource
T2 - An illustrative study
AU - Barrera, Manuel
AU - Balls, Pamela
N1 - Funding Information:
Some of the research described in this paper was supported by a Faculty Grant-in-Aid that was awarded to the first author by Arizona State University. The second author was supported by a National Institute of Mcntal Health predoctoral training fellowship. Special appreciation is extended to Alfonso Bravo of the Arizona Department of Health Services, Carol Lamond-Walker of the Phoenix Union Schwl District, Pat Baird of the Maricopa County Health Department, and their coworkers whose active cooperation made this study possible. A version of this paper was presented at the annual meeting of the Western Psychological Association. Los Angeles, April 1981. All correspondence should be sent to Manuel Barrera, Jr., Department of Psychology, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287.
Copyright:
Copyright 2016 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 1983/7/12
Y1 - 1983/7/12
N2 - Social support is popularly regarded as a naturally existing resource that acts to prevent disorder by buffering the effects of stress or by meeting individuals' fundamental needs for meaningful human attachment. The present paper begins by discussing approaches to measuring social support that might be adopted in needs assessment research. A prospective study of 74 young mothers is described to illustrate the use of multiple measures of support in investigating their relationship to birth outcome measures. In this study, direct relationships were found between birth outcome indices and measures of both prenatal negative life events and psychological distress. Social support network size showed stress moderating effects when Apgar scores served as the outcome measure. When the presence of birth complications served as the criterion variable, moderating effects were also found for a support satisfaction measure. The paper closes by examining some implications of this study for needs assessments designed for the planning of preventive interventions.
AB - Social support is popularly regarded as a naturally existing resource that acts to prevent disorder by buffering the effects of stress or by meeting individuals' fundamental needs for meaningful human attachment. The present paper begins by discussing approaches to measuring social support that might be adopted in needs assessment research. A prospective study of 74 young mothers is described to illustrate the use of multiple measures of support in investigating their relationship to birth outcome measures. In this study, direct relationships were found between birth outcome indices and measures of both prenatal negative life events and psychological distress. Social support network size showed stress moderating effects when Apgar scores served as the outcome measure. When the presence of birth complications served as the criterion variable, moderating effects were also found for a support satisfaction measure. The paper closes by examining some implications of this study for needs assessments designed for the planning of preventive interventions.
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U2 - 10.1300/J293v02n04_04
DO - 10.1300/J293v02n04_04
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84926272501
SN - 0270-3114
VL - 2
SP - 59
EP - 74
JO - Prevention in Human Services
JF - Prevention in Human Services
IS - 4
ER -