Abstract
Social support can be defined as the perception that there are people who provide individuals with emotional or even financial resources. Perceived social support relates to the perception that support is available if the individual needs it. The present study's aim was to discover, within the Brazilian context, preliminary validity evidence as to the scores of the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support. The survey involved 831 workers of both sexes, who answered the preliminary version of the scale's questionnaire, containing 12 items. Factor analysis demonstrated that the Brazilian version preserved the original instrument's items and factors (family, friends and significant others). Multigroup analysis demonstrated configural, metric and scalar invariance between groups classified by sex and occupational category (professionals in the areas of exact sciences and humanities). The data we obtained in the present study led us to the conclusion that the scale is an instrument with evidence of internal structure validity, thus permitting its use in future research.
Keywords:
Social networks; scaling; statistical validity
