Social support across contexts: In times of crisis and in interventions

ABSTRACT

Study 1. As an active ingredient in lifestyle interventions, social support is shown to be effective for promoting positive health outcomes. However, many interventions do not directly assess social support, leaving its impact in these contexts ambiguous. The Diabetes Prevention Program is one of the most well supported lifestyle interventions, and specifically targets decreased weight and increased physical activity. The DPP intervention has many opportunities for the exchange of social resources, but these social aspects remain unassessed. The present study assesses the relationship between perceived social support and the Diabetes Prevention Program outcomes of weight and physical activity. Results demonstrate a significant negative relationship between intraindividual change in social support and intraindividual changes in weight across the trajectory of the intervention. Additionally, this relationship was significantly mediated by intraindividual changes in self-efficacy. However, these relationships were not supported for physical activity. This study contributes to the literature investigating the role of social support in lifestyle interventions, and is the first to do so within the Diabetes Prevention Program. Study 2. The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in drastic restrictions limiting in-person social connection, but also drove adoption and progression in digital communication. Social support can act as a buffer for stress during such times of crisis. However, when social distancing was required, many adapted much of their social interaction into a digital context. There is minimal work understanding how digital social support differs from in-person social support, particularly during a time when in-person social support is already displaced. The present study investigates the relationship between strictness of distancing and perceived digital social support, perceived general social support, and higher perceived loneliness. In a randomized controlled trial (RCT), the present study also assessed the effectiveness of a brief video-based social support intervention for increasing perceived digital social support, increasing perceived general social support, and decreasing perceived stress. Higher strictness of distancing was related to lower perceived digital social support, perceived general social support, and perceived loneliness. Additionally, the intervention group had significantly greater increases in perceived digital social support than controls, but no significant difference in change for general social support or perceived stress. The present study demonstrates the unique context that COVID-19 created for social interaction, and provides initial evidence in support of a brief and low-resource intervention for increasing perceptions of digital social support. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)