Abstract
This study investigated the effects of two social environment variables, social support and anomia, on the self-reported health of older nursing home residents. Three specific hypotheses were tested as well as the fit of the data to the proposed theory. A nonrandom, convenience sample of 91 nursing home residents was drawn from four nursing homes. Only whites who could speak and understand English and who were judged to be cognitively intact or only mildly cognitively impaired were included. The data were analyzed using path analysis. Only one hypothesis asserting that anomia will have direct negative effects on self-reported health was fully supported.