Associations between social support and central components of adolescent materialism: a network analysis

Abstract

Adolescent materialism has been increasingly associated with a range of psychological health issues. This study explored the central components of materialism and their associations with social support using an undirected partial-correlation network. A convenience sample of 1,976 adolescents was recruited from one junior high school and one senior high school in Hebei Province China, and materialism and social support were assessed using previously developed self-report measures. The final analytic sample comprised 1,639 adolescents, with social support assessed at Time 1 and materialism assessed 7 months later at Time 2. Network analysis revealed complex interrelationships between different sources of social support and distinct facets of materialism. Notably, MVS12 (“I’d be happier if I could afford to buy more things”) showed the highest expected influence, highlighting its central position among the materialism nodes within the estimated network. Furthermore, teacher support showed the strongest negative source-level bridge connectivity with materialistic values. These findings highlight teacher support as a potentially important correlate of adolescent materialism and provide a basis for future longitudinal and intervention research.