Adults reporting stronger social support also reported greater community belonging in a survey of 1,613 people in southern Peru.
The pattern was similar in urban and rural groups.
What researchers studied
Researchers conducted a non-experimental cross-sectional survey of adults living in an urban–rural area of southern Peru.
Participants had an average age of 36.7 years.
The team measured perceived social support, social wellbeing and sense of community.
Structural equation modelling and network analysis assessed how the measures related and whether patterns differed between urban and rural respondents.
The mediation model tested whether social wellbeing statistically accounted for part of the support-belonging association.
The study did not follow participants over time.
What they found
Social support was positively associated with social wellbeing, with a standardized coefficient of 0.248.
Social wellbeing was associated with sense of community, with a coefficient of 0.316.
The indirect association was 0.078 and the direct coefficient was 0.027.
The model explained 10.5% of variation in reported community belonging.
Researchers found no statistically significant urban–rural differences in overall network structure or strength, although some descriptive relationships were stronger in rural participants.
Functional social integration was an important network feature.
What it means
The findings suggest community belonging involves more than the number of contacts a person has.
Supportive relationships and opportunities for social integration may both matter.
However, the modest explained variance means most differences in belonging remained outside the statistical model.
Community programmes encouraging connection could be worth testing, but this survey cannot show that they improve wellbeing or belonging.
The research provides hypotheses for practical evaluation, not evidence of an effective intervention.
Important limitation
All measures were taken at one time point, leaving the direction of associations uncertain.
Community belonging might itself influence perceptions of support and wellbeing.
Self-reported measures and the specific social context of southern Peru limit generalizability.
Statistical mediation and network centrality do not establish psychological causation.
Replication across other communities and longitudinal or intervention studies would be needed for stronger conclusions.
Source Information
Study: Social support and social wellbeing in relation to sense of community among adults in an urban–rural area of southern Peru: a network and latent factor analysis approach
Authors: Julio Cesar Huamani-Cahua; Estefany Ojeda-Flores; Liliana Rosario Alvarez Salinas; Nicola Verónica Nieto Bolaños; Ada Luz Rubin Roque; Michael Antony Ojeda-Flores
Journal / Source: Frontiers in Psychology
Published: 4 November 2026
