Social support and health:: A gender analysis.

This study analyzes the relationship between social support and health, both for men and women, and the socio-demographic variables associated with social support. The data was obtained from a convenience community sample of 2 169 adults. Results revealed that low social support was positively related to four GHQ-28 scales of somatic symptoms, anxiety, and insomnia, social dysfunction and severe depression, with coefficients slightly higher for women than for men, except in somatic symptoms and in social dysfunction. Low social support also correlated significantly with the number of self-reported illnesses, but correlation coefficients were very low. The correlations with some socio-demographic variables were low and statistically significant only for women. Social support correlated with educational level, and negatively with age and number of children. In married people no gender difference was found, but single men were found to have less social support than single women. Professionals, both men and women, have more social support than manual workers, and housewives were found to have less social support than nonmanual female workers and professionals.