This project adopted a mixed-method approach to examine relational and contextual factors that influence people’s intention to provide support on SNSs. A pilot survey examined people’s use of SNSs for supportive exchange. Facebook was found to be the most used SNS for support seeking. People responded more often to a close friend’s support-seeking post than to an acquaintance’s post. Building on the findings in the pilot study, a main experiment was conducted to examine the impact of valence of a support seeker’s previous posts and relational closeness on viewers’ perceptions of the support seeker and their intention to provide support. Findings showed that valence of a support seeker’s previous posts affects viewers’ liking and perceived need for support in opposite directions, which in turn influences viewers’ intended support provision. In addition, relational closeness positively affects viewers’ liking of a support seeker and thus their intention to provide support.

该项目采用混合方法来检查影响人们对 SNS 提供支持的意图的关系和上下文因素。一项试点调查调查了人们使用 SNS 进行支持性交流的情况。Facebook 被发现是最常用于寻求支持的 SNS。人们对亲密朋友寻求支持的帖子做出回应的频率高于对熟人的帖子的回应。在试点研究结果的基础上，进行了一项主要实验，以检查寻求支持者之前帖子的效价和关系密切程度对观众对寻求支持者的看法及其提供支持的意图的影响。调查结果表明，寻求支持者之前帖子的效价会影响观众的喜好和对相反方向支持的感知需求，这反过来又会影响观众的预期支持提供。