Although research has examined influence of social ties on health and well-being, it has not clearly identified the characteristics of social support networks that facilitate coping and mediate responses to stress. This study was conducted to determine whether individual differences in social support networks would discriminate between individuals who sought counseling from those who did not. Eighty undergraduate students from a psychology class and 80 undergraduate students from the student counseling center completed measures of life events, psychological distress, social support, and demographic characteristics. Data analysis revealed statistically significant differences between help seekers and nonhelp seekers. Examination of the individual variables relative to their discriminatory power revealed four significant discriminators for life events (number of negative events, perception of very negative events, number of positive events, and perception of very positive events); seven discriminators for psychological distress (obsessive-compulsivity, interpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, psychoticism, trouble falling to sleep, and guilt); one discriminator for social support (density); and four discriminators for demographic characteristics (age, roommates, employment, and prior counseling for self and family). (Author/NB)