Maintenance Behavior and Relationship Quality as Predictors of Perceived Availability of Resources in Newly Formed College Friendship Networks

Abstract

First-year college students are challenged to develop and maintain new friendship networks. This study, informed by an exchange perspective, tests a conceptual model that specifies how relational maintenance, friendship quality, and perceived availability of network resources are associated in newly formed friendship networks. Results from structural equation modeling suggest that, for casual friendships, the association between maintenance and the perceived availability of resources is mediated by the quality of one's casual friendship network. For close friendship networks, reported maintenance behavior was both directly and indirectly associated with the perceived availability of resources. There were also differences between close and casual friendship networks, with students reporting more maintenance behavior in close friendships, and with different behaviors associated with maintenance in close friendship networks than casual friendship networks.