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Social support in bereavement: Developing and validating a new scale.

Jie Li1, Mei Li2, Jon Kent Reid3

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Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

This study introduces the Scale of Social Support in Bereavement (SSB), a new tool to measure various support types for grieving individuals. The SSB demonstrates strong reliability and validity, aiding future bereavement research.

Keywords:
BereavementChineseGriefSocial support

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Area of Science:

  • Psychology
  • Social Sciences
  • Health Sciences

Background:

  • Social support is crucial for bereaved individuals, yet research findings are inconsistent.
  • Inconsistent results may stem from varied conceptualizations and measurements of social support.
  • A validated scale is needed to accurately assess social support in bereavement contexts.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To develop and validate a new scale for measuring social support in bereavement.
  • To provide a comprehensive tool for researchers studying the impact of social support on grief.
  • To establish a psychometrically sound instrument for diverse cultural applications.

Main Methods:

  • Item pool generation from narratives of 28 bereaved Chinese individuals.
  • Item selection and preliminary scale formation (Scale of Social Support in Bereavement - SSB) using item analysis and exploratory factor analysis on 195 bereaved adults.
  • Psychometric property examination (confirmatory factor analysis, convergent validity, reliability) on a separate sample of 196 bereaved adults.

Main Results:

  • Confirmatory factor analysis revealed a robust four-factor structure: living support, economic support, grief processing, and emotion restoration.
  • The SSB demonstrated strong convergent validity, internal consistency reliability, and test-retest reliability.
  • The SSB is the first scale to comprehensively measure diverse types of social support during bereavement.

Conclusions:

  • The newly developed Scale of Social Support in Bereavement (SSB) is a valid and reliable instrument.
  • SSB can be utilized to explore the multifaceted role of social support in the bereavement process.
  • The scale's potential for validation across different cultural contexts is highlighted.