time and whether or not they felt they had someone they could talk to when they had problems. The perceived availability of, and satisfaction with, six specified types of social support received were then assessed. These items were adapted from the Social Support Questionnaire-Short Form [72] based on item wordings used in previous research [68]. For each item (for example, "How often were there people you could really count on to be dependable when you needed help?"), participants were required to report how frequently people were available to provide the specified type of support on a 5-point scale (from all of the time to none of the time). Participants then stated how satisfied they were with this level of support on a 6-point scale (from very satisfied to very dissatisfied).
