Social support and subjective well-being among Hong Kong Chinese young adults

The associations between social support and 3 measures of subjective well-being—depressive symptomatology, negative affect, and positive affect—were studied among Hong Kong Chinese young adults (N = 475) between 16 and 19 years old. Significant bivariate relationships were found between positive affect and all dimensions of social support (including social network size, social contact frequency, satisfaction with social support, instrumental support, and helping others) except composition of social network. Helping others variables and relationship satisfaction variables were negatively related to both depressive symptoms and negative affect. Multiple regression models revealed that satisfaction with relationships with family members and friends was consistently associated with all measures of subjective well-being, and number of friends felt close to was positively related to positive affect. Copyright © 1999 Taylor & Francis.