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Abstract
Research on social support touts the numerous benefits it offers distressed individuals. Although research has made relevant contributions to understanding the reasons social support alleviates distress, current bodies of research inadequately address the circumstances that encourage individuals to engage in support. Therefore, the goal of this thesis was to document the communication and relationship qualities that drive support provision. I turned to communication privacy management theory as a framework for understanding factors that motivate supportive exchanges. The results of the study supported my predictions that co-ownership, boundary permeability, clarity about support rules, and support rule turbulence underlie supportive exchanges. These findings are meaningful because they clarify communication and relationship circumstances that encourage the provision of social support in close relationships. In addition, they have implications for communication privacy management theory and for the study of social support.