While the relationship between stressful life events, social support, and health outcomes has received much attention, efforts to quantify social support and directly examine specific ameliorative effects have resulted in mixed findings. Direct and mediational effects of two psychometrically validated measures of perceived and received social support on both positive and negative psychological functioning were compared in a group of college students (N=97). Subjects completed the Langner Psychiatric Screening Inventory, the Beck Depression Inventory, the Affect Balance Scale, a version of the Quality of Life Scale, and two measures of perceived and received social support: the Interpersonal Support Evaluation List and the Inventory of Socially Supportive Behavior. These measures and the College Student Life Event Scale were administered at two measurement periods separated by an 8-week interval. Analyses based on a multivariate hierarchical regression model revealed that perceived social support was strongly predictive of psychological status independent of initial psychological status, negative life events, or social loss life events. Received social support had extremely limited predictive power. Social non-loss life events, but not social loss life events, were also found to strongly relate to psychological status. (Author/NRB)