Support Functions of the Social Networks of Psychiatric Patients and the General Population

Abstract

Current discussion about the health-care system in developed countries concentrates often on seeking out possibilities to de-institutionalize patients in order to reduce the direct costs linked to the patients themselves. A focus of interest on social support networks for patients, especially informal ones, as an alternative to institutional support emerges from this politically tinged discussion. Another point of interest arises from scientific research in the field of social networks in general, where a clearer conceptualization was, and remains, a major issue. Review-articles1,2, first point out the distinction between a personal social network and a personal social support network. The former can be considered as a structure whereas the latter, from a structural point of view, is a subset of the former. A personal social support network refers to content and has often an underlying psychosocial theory. The network is viewed in both cases from an individual’s point of view.