Unsupportive Responses from Others Concerning a Stressful Life Event: Development of The Unsupportive Social Interactions Inventory

Abstract

Two studies were designed to develop a comprehensive measure of stressor-specific unsupportive social interactions and to examine the construct's relationship to stress, social support, and adjustment. Findings were based on two independent samples of college students (N = 351 and N = 222). Exploratory factor analysis of the newly developed Unsupportive Social Interactions Inventory (USII) revealed four types of unsupportive or upsetting responses that an individual might receive from other people concerning a stressful event in his or her life: distancing, bumbling, minimizing, and blaming. The four-factor model was replicated using confirmatory factor analysis. The 24-item USII and its four subscales demonstrated adequate internal consistency reliability. Stressor-specific unsupportive social interactions accounted for a significant amount of the variance in psychological and physical symptoms, beyond the variance explained by stress and social support. Moreover, the link between stressor-specific unsupportive social interactions and increased symptoms was not an artifact of trait negative affectivity. Results also supported the conceptual distinction between stressor-specific unsupportive social interactions and general negative social interactions.