The Moderating Role of Social Support on the Stress-Distress Relation Among Asian International Students: A Test of the Matching Hypothesis

As a test of the matching hypothesis, the buffering effects of social support were examined on the stress-distress relation among N = 239 undergraduate international students from Asia. International students can experience both unique stressors that are specific to international students and general (i.e., college) stressors that are common to most college students. The negative impact of these stressors on psychological distress may be reduced by appropriate social support from similar others. It was hypothesized that international and co-national support would moderate the relation between unique stressors and psychological distress, and that college support would moderate the relation between college stressors and psychological distress. Exploratory analyses using implicit social support and post-hoc analyses using more specific outcome variables were also conducted. Although the results were not consistent with the original hypotheses, results from the post-hoc analyses indicated that college support interacted with college stressors to exacerbate the relation between stressors and anxiety and phobic anxiety symptoms, respectively. Implications for these unexpected findings are discussed, particularly in regard to outreach with Asian undergraduate international students.