Page 112 - Never Too Far Away? The Roles of Social Network Sites in Sojourners’ Adjustment

support by adding “status updates” in the statement. Please see Appendix B for the list of items (Cronbach’s α = .79).
Perceived relationship quality. We assessed perceived relationship stability (RelStab) using a face-valid one-item measure: “I think my relationship with my partner is very stable” measured on a 7-point scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree, taken from the relational uncertainty measure (Dainton & Aylor, 2001). We measured perceived relationship satisfaction (RelSati) also with a face-valid single item: “In, general, how satisfied are you with your relationship?” measured on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 = very low to 5 = very high, taken from the relationship assessment scale (Hendrick, 1988).
Control variables. To help rule out some confounding variables and to ensure that the observed effects are not artifacts of differences in other forms of communication, we also tested the theoretical model controlling for some variables: Gender, age, length of relationship (measured in years and months), and frequency of interaction with partner using various communication channels. We asked the participants to indicate for each channel how often they communicated with their partner using: Phone, SMS, email, instant messaging, video calling (Skype), and Twitter and Instagram (1 = never to 5 = very often).
Facebook communication with partner. We also asked the participants to indicate how often they communicated with their partner using: Facebook private message (messenger) and Facebook public communication (wall) (1 = never to 5 = very often) to assess Facebook use specifically with their partners.
Distance relationship status. We added two items to check LDRR and GCRR self-identification of participants: “My partner lives far enough away from me that it would be very difficult or impossible for me to see him/her every day”, taken from the LDR index (Pistole & Roberts, 2011), and “My partner lives in another country”, both measured on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree, Cronbach’s α = .80).
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