An enormous body of research on social support has been generated over the last decade, but this work has largely ignored personal characteristics that influence the utilization of support networks. The Network Orientation Scale is a self-report measure of negative network orientation—the perspective that it is inadvisable, useless, or risky to seek help from others. In this paper, factor analyses were performed on data from 48 women and 32 men in college. Three meaningful factors emerged, reflecting independence (and norms regarding help-seeking), help-seeking history, and mistrust.
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