Development and validation of the support marshaling scale

Research on social support has consistently underscored its importance for well-being, but overlooked that it needs to be accomplished through skillful communication activities transacted between support recipients and providers. The current study sought to develop and validate a support marshaling scale (SMS). Grounded in social contextual theory and the principles of relational sensemaking and network structuring, as well as within prior work establishing the existence of four support marshaling styles, two studies were conducted to develop a multidimensional scale of support marshaling. The resulting 25-item SMS correlated in expected ways with variables representing levels of self-esteem, aspects of personality, and reported stress. Implications for its utility as well as theoretical and methodological comparison are discussed.