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Investigating relationships among cancer survivors’ engagement in an online support community, social support perceptions, well-being, and moderating effects of existing (offline) social support

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Abstract

Purpose

Socially supportive relationships help cancer survivors cope with their diagnosis and may improve quality of life; however, many survivors report unmet support and information needs. Online communities of survivors may address these needs, but research on their benefits have been equivocal. This cross-sectional, self-report study investigated relationships among cancer survivors’ level of engagement in an online survivor community (The American Cancer Society Cancer Survivors Network®; CSN), perceptions of emotional/informational support available from online communities (“online social support”), well-being, and moderating effects of “offline social support.”

Methods

Participants were 1255 registered users of the CSN who completed surveys between 2013 and 2014. Three types of engagement with the CSN—social/communal, interpersonal communication, and informational/search engagement—were identified through principal components analysis. Regression analyses examined hypotheses.

Results

More frequent social/communal and interpersonal communication engagement were associated with increased online social support (p < .0001), and the relationship between interpersonal communication engagement and online social support was strongest for survivors reporting lower offline social support (interaction β = − .35, p < .001). Greater online social support was associated with increased well-being, but only among survivors reporting low offline social support (interaction β = − .35, p < .0001).

Conclusions

Engagement in online survivor communities may increase support perceptions that promote well-being, but benefits may accrue more to survivors reporting low offline social support.

Implications for Cancer survivors

Newly diagnosed cancer survivors, particularly those with unmet emotional/informational support needs, should be given the opportunity to communicate with other survivors through online survivor support networks.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. American Cancer Society, 250 Williams St. NW, Atlanta, 30303, Georgia

    J. Lee Westmaas, Elizabeth Fallon, Bennett R. McDonald, Deborah Driscoll, Kristi Richardson, Kenneth Portier & Tenbroeck Smith

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  1. J. Lee Westmaas
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  2. Elizabeth Fallon
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  3. Bennett R. McDonald
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  4. Deborah Driscoll
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  5. Kristi Richardson
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  6. Kenneth Portier
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  7. Tenbroeck Smith
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to J. Lee Westmaas.

Ethics declarations

This study was funded by The American Cancer Society.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Westmaas, J.L., Fallon, E., McDonald, B.R. et al. Investigating relationships among cancer survivors’ engagement in an online support community, social support perceptions, well-being, and moderating effects of existing (offline) social support. Support Care Cancer 28, 3791–3799 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-019-05193-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-019-05193-2

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