Social Support for Students of Social Informatics (2004-2005)

The updated MTMM measurement model, designed by Saris and Andrews (1991), was used to assess the measurement quality of the four dimensions of the social support because it can assess the validity, reliability and impact of the method for each variable separately. Based on theoretical and empirical insights, four network generators were created to measure the theoretically justified dimensions of social support. The content of network generators for measuring material (two name generators), information (two name generators) and emotional support and socialising was adapted to the characteristics of experimental groups — students of the fourth year of Social Informatics of the Faculty of Social Sciences in Ljubljana. A complex experimental plan was designed to find factors that influence the quality of social support measurement using a survey questionnaire. The experimental design contains features of a measurement instrument that can influence the estimations of the reliability, validity and impact of methods that researchers have already recognised the quality of the data obtained by the survey as relevant. The experimental plan included two different measurement scales (binary and five graded orthodoxy scales with marked extremes), one technique of data collection (listing by memory), acceptance of social support (basic questions), limiting the number of choices (up to five choices) and without limitation, and time between successive measurements (beginning and end of lectures).