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Abstract
Women with cancer often experience the risk of infertility and reproductive difficulties due to the cancer treatments. Social support is important for women to understand and to manage the challenges of infertility. This study was designed to explore both the exchange of social support and how negative social support was expressed in two online discussion boards. Five types of social support were studied: informational, emotional, appraisal, network, and instrumental support. We used qualitative content analysis with a directed coding scheme to examine two popular discussion boards for women with post-cancer infertility and reproductive difficulty. The results showed that all five types of social support were used in the discussion boards and that, at times, social support could turn negative. Future research directions for this area of inquiry are discussed.