Uniqueness of Spousal Support

Abstract

e aim of this paper is to explore the uniqueness of marital relationships through examining the substitutability of spousal support by other forms of support.Using data from the National Family Research of Japan 2008 NFRJ08 , we tested both the e ect of spousal support and other forms of support on psychological distress. We found that spousal support had a much greater e ect on distress than other forms of support. We also found that the availability of other forms of support had little e ect on distress if one had spousal support. Among women, other forms of support partially substituted for spousal support if one did not have spousal support, while among men, we did not nd any substitutive e ect of other forms of support. Consequently, the ndings of this study implied that spousal support was more distinctive for men than for women, and that women were less dependent on their spouse than men.