The Social Support Questionnaire (SSQ) is a quantitative, psychometrically sound survey questionnaire intended to measure social support and satisfaction with said social support from the perspective of the interviewee. Degree of

social support Social support is the perception and actuality that one is cared for, has assistance available from other people, and, most popularly, that one is part of a supportive social network. These supportive resources can be emotional (e.g., nurturance), ...

has been shown to influence the onset and course of certain psychiatric disorders such as

clinical depression Major depressive disorder (MDD), also known as clinical depression, is a mental disorder characterized by at least two weeks of pervasive low mood, low self-esteem, and loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities. Intro ...

schizophrenia Schizophrenia () is a mental disorder characterized variously by hallucinations (typically, Auditory hallucination#Schizophrenia, hearing voices), delusions, thought disorder, disorganized thinking and behavior, and Reduced affect display, f ...

. The SSQ was approved for public release in 1981 by Irwin Sarason, Henry Levine, Robert Basham and Barbara Sarason under the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...

Department of Psychology and consists of 27 questions. Overall, the SSQ has good test-retest reliability and convergent internal construct validity.

Overview

The questionnaire is designed so that each question has a two-part answer. The first part asks the interviewee to list up to nine people available to provide support that meet the criteria stated in the question. These support individuals are specified using their initials in addition to the relationship to the interviewee. Example questions from the first part includes questions such as "Whom could you count on to help if you had just been fired from your job or expelled from school?" and "Whom do you feel would help if a family member very close to you died?". The second part asks the interviewee to specify how satisfied they are with each of the people stated in the first part. The SSQ respondents use a 6 -point

Likert scale A Likert scale ( ,) is a psychometric scale named after its inventor, American social psychologist Rensis Likert, which is commonly used in research questionnaires. It is the most widely used approach to scaling responses in survey research, s ...

to indicate their degree of satisfaction with the support from the above people ranging from "1 - very dissatisfied" to "6 - very satisfied". The Social Support Questionnaire has multiple short forms such as the SSQ3 and the SSQ6.

History

The SSQ is based on 4 original studies. The first study set out to determine whether the SSQ had the desired psychometric properties. The second study tried to relate SSQ and a diversity of personality measures such as

anxiety Anxiety is an emotion characterised by an unpleasant state of inner wikt:turmoil, turmoil and includes feelings of dread over Anticipation, anticipated events. Anxiety is different from fear in that fear is defined as the emotional response ...

, depression and hostility in connection with the Multiple Affect Adjective Checklist. The third study considered the relationship between social support, the prior year's negative and positive life events, internal-external

locus of control Locus of control is the degree to which people believe that they, as opposed to external forces (beyond their influence), have control over the outcome of events in their lives. The concept was developed by Julian B. Rotter in 1954, and has sinc ...

and self- esteem in conjunction with the Life Experiences Survey. The fourth study tested the idea that social support could serve as a buffer when faced with difficult life situations via trying to solve a maze and subsequently completing the Cognitive Interference Questionnaire.

Scoring

The overall support score (SSQN) is calculated by taking an average of the individual scores across the 27 items. A high score on the SSQ indicates more optimism about life than a low score. Respondents with low SSQ scores have a higher prevalence of negative life events and illness. Scoring is as follows: 1. Add the total number of people for all 27 items (questions). (Max. is 243). Divide by 27 for average item score. This gives you SSQ Number Score, or SSQN. 2. Add the total satisfaction scores for all 27 items (questions). (Max is 162). Divide by 27 for average item score. This gives you SSQ Satisfaction score or SSQS. 3. Finally, you can average the above for the total number of people that are family members - this results in the SSQ family score.

Reliability

According to Sarason, the SSQ takes between fifteen and eighteen minutes to properly administer and has "good" test-retest reliability.

Validity

The SSQ was compared with the depression scale and validity tests show significant negative correlation ranging from -0.22 to -0.43. The SSQ and the optimism scale have a correlation of 0.57. The SSQ and the satisfaction score have a correlation of 0.34. The SSQ has high

internal consistency In statistics and research, internal consistency is typically a measure based on the correlations between different items on the same test (or the same subscale on a larger test). It measures whether several items that propose to measure the same g ...

among items.

Linkages

The SSQ has been used to show that higher levels of social support correlated with less suicide ideation in Military Medical University Soldiers in Iran in 2015. A low level of social support is an important

risk factor In epidemiology, a risk factor or determinant is a variable associated with an increased risk of disease or infection. Due to a lack of harmonization across disciplines, determinant, in its more widely accepted scientific meaning, is often use ...

in women for

dysmenorrhea Dysmenorrhea, also known as period pain, painful periods or menstrual cramps, is pain during menstruation. Its usual onset occurs around the time that menstruation begins. Symptoms typically last less than three days. The pain is usually in th ...

or menstrual cramps. Low Social Support is the strongest predictor of dysmenorrhea when compared to affect, personality and

alexithymia Alexithymia, also called emotional blindness, is a neuropsychological phenomenon characterized by significant challenges in recognizing, expressing, feeling, sourcing, and describing one's emotions. It is associated with difficulties in attachme ...

.{{Cite journal, last1=Anisi, first1=Jafar, last2=Majdian, first2=Mohammad, last3=Mirzamani, first3=S. Mahmood, date=2010, title=The Factors Associated with Suicide Ideation in Iranian Soldiers, journal=Iranian Journal of Psychiatry, volume=5, issue=3, pages=97–101, issn=1735-4587, pmc=3430507, pmid=22952500

Related surveys

SSQ3

The SSQ3 is a short form of the SSQ and has only three questions. The SSQ3 has acceptable test-test reliability and correlation with personality variables as compared to the long form of the Social Support Questionnaire. The internal reliability was borderline but this low level of internal reliability is as expected since there are only three questions.

SSQ6

The SSQ6 is a short form of the SSQ. The SSQ6 has been shown to have high correlation with: the SSQ, SSQ personality variables and internal reliability. In the development of the SSQ6, the research suggests that professed social support in adults may be a connected to "early attachment experience." The SSQ6 consists of the below 6 questions: 1. Whom can you really count on to be dependable when you need help? 2. Whom can you really count on to help you feel more relaxed when you are under pressure or tense? 3. Who accepts you totally, including both your worst and your best points? 4. Whom can you really count on to care about you, regardless of what is happening to you? 5. Whom can you really count on to help you feel better when you are feeling generally down-in-the-dumps? 6. Whom can you count on to console you when you are very upset?

Interpersonal Support Evaluation List (ISEL)

The Interpersonal Support Evaluation List includes 40 items (questions) with four sub-scales in the areas of Tangible Support, Belonging Support, Self-Esteem Support and Appraisal Support. The interviewee rates each item based on how true or false they feel the item is for themselves. The four total response options are "Definitely True", "Probably True", "Probably False", and "Definitely False".

References

Clinical psychology Social networks Communication theory Economic sociology Mental health