Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology
Volume 50, Issue 7, 2019, Pages 827-847

Social Support Benefits Psychological Adjustment of International Students: Evidence From a Meta-Analysis (Article) (Open Access)

Bender M.* , van Osch Y. , Sleegers W. , Ye M.
  • a Tilburg University, Netherlands, Gratia Christian College, Hong Kong
  • b Tilburg University, Netherlands
  • c Tilburg University, Netherlands
  • d Erasmus University Rotterdam, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands

Abstract

A growing body of literature is exploring the link between social support and international students’ psychological adjustment. So far, however, there has been no systematic assessment of the overall relationship, and no indication which types and sources of social support may be most strongly associated with psychological adjustment. Our meta-analysis of 257 effect sizes across 76 studies fills this gap and assesses (a) the magnitude of the overall association between social support and international students’ psychological adjustment, (b) how different types (subjective, objective, and mixed) and sources (host, conational, international, mixed, and unspecified) of social support moderate the relationship between social support and psychological adjustment, and (c) whether the relationship between social support and psychological adjustment holds across different operationalizations of psychological adjustment. We find a positive overall association (r =.20, 95% confidence interval [CI] = [0.16, 0.23]) between social support and international students’ psychological adjustment. Types and sources of social support matter as well: Subjective social support relates more strongly to psychological adjustment than objective social support. The data revealed that only support from mixed sources (i.e., not distinguishing between internationals, host, or conationals) is associated with a stronger effect of social support than support from conationals or from fellow international students (compared with support from host sources). We find no differences in the relation between social support and positive or negative adjustment. We outline recommendations for future research based on the meta-analysis. © The Author(s) 2019.

Author Keywords

International students Social support Meta-analysis Acculturation psychological adjustment

Index Keywords

effect size social support cultural factor Article meta analysis psychological adjustment student human

Link
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85070472816&doi=10.1177%2f0022022119861151&partnerID=40&md5=36087f0d4f474b70afb4b7b49ef4321b

DOI: 10.1177/0022022119861151
ISSN: 00220221
Cited by: 1
Original Language: English