Date of Award

1-1-2014

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Organizational Unit

Graduate School of Social Work

First Advisor

Julie A. Laser, Ph.D.

Second Advisor

James H. Williams

Third Advisor

Rafael Fajardo

Fourth Advisor

Marian Bussey

Fifth Advisor

Ruth Chao

Keywords

Communication, Facebook, Frequency, Social support

Abstract

This dissertation explored relationships between the frequency of public communication on the social networking website Facebook and the level of social support an individual perceives. Students in the Graduate School of Social Work and the Emergent Digital Practices program were surveyed. Correlation and regression analyses were used to examine the relationship between the variables. Findings from the analysis indicated that the frequency of posting statuses on Facebook and the frequency of responding to other's status updates on Facebook was significantly and negatively associated with a perception of tangible social support. The frequency of these types of communication were not significantly associated with the perception of appraisal, belonging, or self-esteem social support. The frequency of others responding to one's status posts was not significantly associated to the perception of any type of social support. The implications of these findings for theory, research, and social work practice are explored.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Granger Petersen

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

115 p.

Discipline

Social work

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