Social support, coping, and anxiety in the context of parental divorce and other stressors

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of social support perception on anxiety and coping in adolescents who have experienced parental divorce compared to adolescents who have not experienced parental divorce and across gender. Surveys were administered to 125 grade 10-12 students from urban high schools. Coping was measured using a revised Coping Scale for Sport (Haney, 2003), anxiety was measured using the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (Spielberger, 1983), and social support was measured using the Social Support Questionnaire - Short Form (Sarason, Sarason, Shearin, & Pierce, 1987). Findings indicated a significant main effect for social support number and family status (non-divorce, divorce), indicating that the non-divorce group has a higher mean average number of social supports than the divorce group. A significant main effect was also found for social support number and gender, indicating that females have a higher mean average number of social supports than males. Furthermore, the relationship between engagement coping and social support satisfaction approached significance and a significant relationship was found for the female group, indicating that the greater the perceived quality of social support, the greater the use of engagement coping. Ad-Hoc analyses found significant differences for disengagement coping across gender; significant relationships between disengagement coping and anxiety; and a significant relationship between the qualitative coping scale theme “Illness of a Family Member or Pet” and disengagement coping. Findings are discussed in light of current literature.Education, Faculty ofEducational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education (ECPS), Department ofGraduat