Content area
Abstract
Fibromyalgia syndrome (FM) is a chronic pain condition that has been found to impact a person's emotional, cognitive, and perceived physical functioning. Social support has been linked to improved functioning for a variety of health conditions. This study investigated whether specific types of social support (emotional, tangible, affectionate, and positive social interaction) had a relationship with depression, executive functioning, and perceived physical functioning in a sample of 70 people with FM (age M = 67.9, SD = 8.74) and 76 people without FM (age M = 59.6, SD = 7.58). Demographic information was collected and participants were assessed on multiple measures including the MOS-SSS, BDI-II, a verbal fluency task, and the CPF. Controlling for demographic covariates, multiple regression analysis revealed overall social support and emotional social support were significant moderators of depression for the FM group. Tangible social support was not found to be a moderator of any of the outcome measures. Affectionate social support was found to be a marginally significant moderator (p = .091) of perceived physical functioning. Positive social interaction was found to be a significant moderator of executive functioning and a marginally significant moderator of perceived physical functioning (p = .067). The results of this study suggest that having a variety of types of social support may be more beneficial for people with FM than having abundance of any single type of support.