Social Support and HIV-related Risk Behaviors: A Systematic Review of the Global Literature

Abstract

Existing empirical evidence has well documented the role of social support in both physical and psychological well-being among various populations. In the context of HIV prevention, the rapid increase of studies on social support merits a systematic review to synthesize the current global literature on association between social support and HIV-related risk behaviors. The current review reveals a complex picture of this relationship across diverse populations. Existing studies indicate that higher levels of social support are related to fewer HIV-related risk behaviors among female sex workers and people living with HIV/AIDS and heterosexual adults in general. However, influences of social support on HIV-related risk behaviors are inconsistent within drug users, men who have sex with men and adolescents. These variations in findings may be attributed to different measurement of social support in different studies, specific context of social support for diverse population, or various characteristics of the social networks the study population obtained support from. Future studies are needed to explore the mechanism of how social support affects HIV-related risk behaviors. HIV prevention intervention efforts need to focus on the positive effect of social support for various vulnerable and at-risk populations. Future efforts also need to incorporate necessary structure change and utilize technical innovation in order to maximize the protective role of social support in HIV risk prevention or reduction.

HIV-Related Sexual Risk among African American Men Preceding Incarceration: Associations with Support from Significant Others, Family, and Friends

“…Our results suggest that pre-release interventions focused on maintaining and strengthening social ties to loved ones in the community, particularly ties to significant others, during incarceration may help reduce HIV sexual risk behaviors during community re-entry. Our findings expand those of previous studies to delineate the independent effects of different sources of support on sexual risk-taking [7,12,18,19] and support extant studies highlighting the importance of [23,24,45,46]. By directly comparing distinct sources of support, the current study has been able to underscore the salience of significant other support in reduced HIV risk.…”

“…An additional limitation is that, because all variables were assessed at one point in time, we made assumptions about which variables were likely confounders and which variables should be considered as mediating factors and hence should be excluded from models. Specifically, we adjusted for age and a poverty indicator (e.g., ability to pay bills) in multivariate models but did not adjust for other mental health and substance use factors given that prior literature suggests they lie in the pathway between the social support and HIV risk [7,12,15,18]. Additional studies in larger samples should formally evaluate the pathways through which social support may protect against sexual risk-taking.…”

“…During a stressful event, perceived or received social support may mitigate the negative emotional response or physiologic and/or behavioral response to stress [7]. Given that individuals involved in the criminal justice system are believed to experience higher levels of stress both before incarceration and during reentry, perceived social support may act as a buffer from stress by enabling these individuals to cope, [7][8][9][10][11][12][13] which in turn may reduce determinants of risky sex including substance use and mental disorders [14][15][16][17][18][19].…”

The Value of Support Group Participation in Influencing Adherence to Antiretroviral Treatment among People Living with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV)

“…Social support interventions are one such strategy. Some studies have established a link between perceived social support and physical and mental health [13]- [16]. Also, social support has been found to promote psychological adjustment in people with high stress due to chronic health problems like HIV/AIDS [17].…”

Virtual and Real Social Support Networks in Mental Health of Japanese HIV-Positive Men: Nationwide HIV/AIDS Web Research

“…4 Positive social support for PLHIV is reflected in a good mental health status, 5 medication adherence, 6 and appropriate risk behavior. 7 In recent years, personal connections via the Internet have grown alongside the development of social networking services. Social support has increasingly adopted the form of virtual communities and electronic support groups.…”