Influence of Social Support Received in Online and Offline Contexts on Satisfaction With Social Support and Satisfaction With Life: A Longitudinal Study

Abstract

People around the globe now regularly interact with family and friends through social network sites (SNSs). In this article, we investigated the differences between social interactions in online and offline contexts as well as users' satisfaction with the social support received in these contexts. It was hypothesized that SNSs are better set up for the task of leveraging informational support but that they are inferior to offline contexts in terms of emotional or instrumental support. We further assumed that users might feel similarly satisfied with how support is rendered online and offline but that only social support transacted in offline contexts would contribute to overall life satisfaction. All hypotheses were supported by longitudinal data (N = 327) that were used to investigate social support over the course of 2 years with 4 points of measurement.