Hesitancy and motivation for self-disclosure about loneliness
Main Article Content
We examined the effect of the factors of hesitancy toward and the motivation for self-disclosure on loneliness using the postulated model: hesitancy toward and motivation for self-disclosure → self-disclosure→ loneliness. Five scales about self-disclosure and loneliness were administered to 235 junior high school students. Findings suggest that release of one’s feelings strongly promotes self-disclosure and anxiety about the target causes hesitancy toward engaging in self-disclosure; hesitancy toward personal or private self-disclosure also has an effect on loneliness.
There have been many studies about self-disclosure in social psychology or clinical psychology. Self-disclosure refers to the process by which individuals reveal personal thoughts, feelings, and experiences to other people (Reis, 2000). Self-disclosure has been one of the most commonly studied features of relationship developments. The importance of disclosing personal and intimate information about oneself has been emphasized in the context of friendship formation and good health. For a person who is in a negative condition, self-disclosure is especially effective in improving both mental and physical health.
While self-disclosure has been found to have positive effects, some effects have also been found to be negative. Hatfield (1984) listed negative effects of self-disclosure as follows: fear of exposure, fear of abandonment, fear of angry attacks, fear of loss of control, fear of one’s own destructive impulses, and fear of losing one’s individuality. Disclosing negative information sometimes has an especially harmful influence on the individual. For example, by disclosing themselves, people expose their weak points to others and this may result in their being disliked even by close friends. In Japan young people of today tend to fear unnecessarily that they might be hurt by the words of others or by their attitudes. It seems that they cannot express their feelings and ideas with their friends as easily as previous generations could. In the context of friendship formation, a number of researchers have emphasized the importance of self-disclosure. Real self-disclosure is essential for the formation of friendship.
Many contemporary researchers studying loneliness have mentioned the importance of self-disclosure in relation to loneliness. Young (1982) emphasized the role of self-disclosure in building intimate relationships that can decrease feelings of loneliness. The relationship between self-disclosure and loneliness is mediated by the response of the recipient of the self-disclosures. Self-disclosure, especially disclosures of negative information, that are met with acceptance and with reciprocation, lead to feelings of closeness and intimacy. Disclosures that are rejected produce feeling of loneliness (Stokes, 1987). It has been reported that most young people tend to feel loneliness in adolescence. Determining the factors causing hesitancy toward and motivation for self-disclosure and the effects of these on loneliness could help decrease loneliness in adolescents.
The first purpose in this study was to examine which factors motivate and cause hesitancy toward self-disclosure, and the second purpose was to examine which factors affect loneliness of junior high school students – a population previously unstudied in Japan. Figure 1 shows the causal model used to explore the two purposes described above.
Figure 1. Model of hesitancy toward and motivation for self-disclosure to loneliness.
Method
Participants
The study was conducted in February of 2000 with a total of 235 junior high school students (111 boys and 124 girls, whose mean age was 13.9 years).
Participants responded to four scales designed to measure self-disclosure, hesitancy toward self-disclosure, motivation for self-disclosure, and loneliness.
Procedure
Questionnaire content
Self-disclosure scale: Participants were asked how often they talk to their close friends about 10 self-relevant topics, such as “your sad experience” or “your personal character”. A 4-point response scale was used for the ratings, with anchors of never talk (1) to always talk (4). Most adolescents disclose more easily to their close friends (Enomoto, 1997) than to their parents or teachers. Their close friends become an object for self-disclosure.
Scale of hesitancy toward self-disclosure: Participants were asked to imagine when and why they hesitate to disclose. A 4-point scale was used for the ratings, with anchors of not at all (1) to very strongly (4).
Motivation for self-disclosure scale: Participants were asked when and why they want to disclose to their close friends. A 4-point response scale was used for the ratings, with anchors of not at all (1) to very strongly (4).
Loneliness scale: Twelve items were adopted from the study by Russell, Peplau, and Cutrona (1980) and modified to fit the loneliness of junior high school students. The original scale by Russell et al. comprised 20 items, however, because all participants in this study were junior high school students some items – which were too deep and serious for this age group – were excluded. Because this group sometimes feel strong loneliness in their school life, especially when they cannot get along with their friends, 12 items were selected which relate to adolescent friendship. It was considered that these 12 items were enough for this study. A 4-point response scale was used for the ratings, with anchors of not at all (1) to very strongly (4).
Results and Discussion
Factor Analysis of the Self-Disclosure Scale
To examine the factor structure of 10 items of the self-disclosure scale, a principal components analysis was conducted on these items. The scree plot indicated a two-factor solution. The two factors accounted for 54.05% of the total variance. After varimax rotation, only items with factor loadings greater than .40 were considered. The items and their loadings on each factor are shown in the Appendix. The first factor (with Cronbach’s α =.82) was named self-disclosure about internal aspect of self as it comprised items related to particularly deep topics such as “one’s bad experience” or “personality”. The second factor (with Cronbach’s α =.70) was named self-disclosure about superficial aspect of self, as it comprised items related to topics such as “one’s dream” or “successful experience”.
Factor Analysis of the Hesitancy Toward Self-Disclosure Scale
To examine the 20 items of the hesitancy toward self-disclosure scale, a principal components analysis was conducted on these items. The scree plot indicated a three-factor solution. The three factors accounted for 43.99% of the total variance. After varimax rotation, items with factor loadings greater than .40 were considered. The items and their loadings on each factor are shown in the Appendix.
The first factor was named anxiety about friendship as it comprised items related to the anxiety of the discloser after disclosing. The second factor was named anxiety about target (comparison to talk with) as it comprised items related to anxiety about the response of the recipient. The third factor was named privacy, as it comprised items related to the privacy of the discloser and the recipient. To examine the internal consistency of each factor, Cronbach’s alpha was calculated, and for anxiety about friendship, it was .76, for anxiety about target, .69 and for privacy, .63.
Factor Analysis of the Motivation for Self-Disclosure Scale
To examine the 20 items of the motivation for self-disclosure scale, a principal components analysis was conducted on these items. The scree plot indicated a three-factor solution. The three factors accounted for 48.90% of the total variance. After varimax rotation, items with factor loadings greater than .45 were considered. The items and their loadings on each factor are shown in the Appendix.
The first factor was named trust of target (α = .71) as it comprised items related to the trust in, and reliance on, the target. The second factor was named release of one’s feelings (α = .64) as it comprised items related to the feelings that the discloser cannot help talking to someone. The third factor was named expectation of friendship formation (α = .60) as it comprised items related to expressing the expectation of friendship formation after self-disclosure.
Factor Analysis of the Loneliness Scale
To examine the 12 items of the loneliness scale a principal components analysis was conducted on these items. The scree plot indicated a two-factor solution, both with eigenvalues greater than one. The two factors accounted for 53.90% of the total variance. After varimax rotation, items with factor loadings greater than .50 were considered. The items and their loadings on each factor are shown in the appendix.
The first factor was named feelings of estrangement (α = .85) as it comprised items related to the feeling that the discloser was estranged from their friends. The second factor was named feelings of instability in personal relationship (α = .74) as it comprised items related to the feeling that the discloser cannot get along with their friends.
Sex Difference
Table 1 shows the means and SDs by sex for all factors and sums of the factor scores for items for both boys and girls.
The t test on mean scores for all factors and sums of the factor scores were conducted to examine the sex difference. The result showed that self-disclosure about superficial aspect of self, trust of target, and release of one’s feelings were significant (p < .01).
Table 1. Means and Standard Deviations of Ratings on all Factors By Sex (N = 235)
On each of these three factors, the scores of the girls were higher than those of the boys. Although studies have been made of the sex difference of self-disclosure, there is little agreement. But in most studies it has been reported that the women’s scores of self-disclosure were higher than those of the men. In this study we gained similar results and for anxiety about target, the feelings of estrangement were also significant (p < .05). The mean for boys was higher than for girls. Ochiai and Satoh (1996), in comparing the difference between boys and girls in friendship, found that girls try to understand each other more than do boys, even if they might be hurt by their friends. Compared with girls, boys typically have only a few friends with whom they can discuss everything. In this study we achieved a similar result.
Relationships Among Factors
The correlation of these scales is shown in Table 2. Self-disclosure about internal aspect of self was negatively correlated with scores on anxiety about target (r = .20, p < .01) and privacy (r = .16, p < .01). And for self-disclosure about superficial aspect of self, the correlation was not significant. It is clear that adolescents tend to withhold information about themselves, especially regarding personal and intimate topics and that they feel anxiety about the response of the recipient when they disclose themselves.
Figure 2. Path diagram of the effect of hesitancy toward and the motivation for self-disclosure on loneliness (* p < .01)
The two factors of self-disclosure were positively correlated with scores on all factors of the motivation for self-disclosure. The release of one’s feelings showed a very marked positive correlation with self-disclosure about internal aspect of self (r = .47, p < .01). It appeared that the deeper the topics, the greater the desire to release feelings by disclosing. Two factors of self-disclosure were also negatively correlated with scores on feelings of instability in personal relationships. This result showed that the people who were non-disclosing about internal aspects of self tended to feel loneliness, and feel strongly that they could not get along with their friends.
The correlations described above are consistent with the hypothesis that hesitancy toward or motivation for self-disclosure has an effect on loneliness. To examine the relationships among these factors in detail, a series of multiple regression analyses was performed. In the first analysis, hesitancy toward self-disclosure and motivation for self-disclosure scores were predicted by self-disclosure scores. In the second analysis, loneliness scores were predicted by self-disclosure scores. And in the third analysis, loneliness scores were predicted by hesitancy toward self-disclosure and motivation for self-disclosure scores.
The first group of multiple regression analyses was conducted with two self-disclosure factors as a dependent variable and six factors of hesitancy toward self-disclosure and motivation for self-disclosure as an independent variable. The standardized partial regression coefficients indicated that for self-disclosure about internal and superficial aspect of self the effects of anxiety about the target (β = .30), release of one’s feelings (β = .45), and trust of the target (β = .17) were significant (p < .01).
Table 2. Correlation of All Factors
The second group of multiple regression analyses was conducted with loneliness scores as a dependent variable and self-disclosure about internal aspect of self and self-disclosure about superficial aspect of self as independent variables. The standard partial regression coefficients indicated that on feelings of instability in personal relationship, the effect of self-disclosure about internal aspect of self (β = .20) was significant (p < .01).
The third group of multiple regression analyses was conducted with the two factors of loneliness scores as a dependent variable and the six factors of hesitancy toward self-disclosure and motivation for self-disclosure as independent variables. The standard partial regression coefficients indicated that for feelings of estrangement the effect of the anxiety about target (β = .20) was significant, and also indicated that for feelings of instability in personal relationship, the effect of trust of a target (β = .37) was significant (p < .01).
The results of this path analysis showed that, especially in self-disclosure about internal aspect of self, anxiety is felt about the response of the recipient. At the same time, release of one’s feelings motivates self-disclosure. The results also suggested that if there is an inability to disclose the internal aspect of self, loneliness may be felt.
In this study we examined the factors that make people hesitate to disclose themselves and the factors that motivate people to disclose themselves. The results of this study showed hesitancy toward self-disclosure has an effect on loneliness, and consequently, to decrease the loneliness of adolescents as much as possible, it is important for them to form a good friendship so that they can openly disclose themselves.
Appendix
Items of the self-disclosure, hesitancy toward self-disclosure, motivation for self-disclosure, and loneliness scales and their rotated factor loadings
Self-disclosure
Self-disclosure about internal aspect of self
1. my sad experience (.83)
2. my unpleasant experience (.80)
3. my worries (.80)
4. experiences of being hurt by others (76)
5. my personal character (.52)
6. a person I like (.50)
7. past happening that I regret (.42)
Self-disclosure about superficial aspect of self
1. my dreams that I want to come true (.90)
2. my future (.88)
3. past experiences of my success (.46)
Hesitancy toward self-disclosure
anxiety about friendship
1. I do not want to be disliked by others (.78)
2. I do not want to cool down our friendship (.68)
3. I do not want to be hurt by the reactions of my companion (.65)
4. I do not want to be criticized (.57)
5. My friends do not always accept my feelings (.57)
6. I want to pretend to be a good person (.47)
Anxiety about the target
1. I am ashamed of disclosing myself (.71)
2. I do not want my weak points to be known (.66)
3. I do not want others to have another image of me (.58)
4. I do not have confidence in myself (.51)
5. My friend also withholds information about himself (.43)
Privacy
1. We should not disclose ourselves so often (.68)
2. I do not want to be known my real feelings by others (.65)
3. I do not want my privacy disturbed (.63)
4. I do not know my real feelings (.54)
Motivation for self-disclosure
Trust of a target
1. Because I like my friend (.84)
2. My friend shows a great liking for me (.69)
3. Because I trust my friend (.66)
4. My personal character resembles the character of my friend (.48)
Release of one’s feelings
1. I do not want to keep secrets from my friend (.71)
2. Even if I have secrets, I think they will soon come out (.68)
3. I am tired of pretending to be a good person (.61)
4. I want someone to hear my worries (.45)
Expectation of friendship formation
1. I have confidence in myself (.64)
2. I want to make friends with this person (.61)
3. I feel comfortable by disclosing myself (.57)
4. I think self-disclosure is important for us to keep a good friendship (.52)
Loneliness scale
Feelings of estrangement
1. I feel that I am somehow different from other people (.76)
2. I do not have any friends on whom I can rely (.75)
3. I do not have any friends (.71)
4. I am lonely now (.68)
5. I sometimes feel that I am alone (.63)
6. I do not have any companion to talk with (.59)
7. I feel that my ideas or feelings do not fit those of others (.52)
8. I am not sociable (.52)
Feelings of instability in personal relationship
1. I get along with my friend * (.77)
2. I have a lot of friends* (.76)
3. I like to talk to anyone* (.73)
4. Everyone surrounding me understands me well* (.65)
* reversed score
** These are English translations of the Japanese items.
The numbers in parentheses are the factor loadings of the items.
Enomoto, H. (1997). Psychological study of self-disclosure. Kyoto: Kitaojisyobo. [In Japanese]
Hatfield, E. (1984). The dangers of intimacy. In V. Derlega (Ed.), Communication, intimacy, and close relationships (pp. 207-220). New York: Academic Press.
Ochiai, Y., & Satoh, Y. (1996). The developmental change of friendship in adolescence. Japanese Journal of Educational Psychology, 44, 55-65.
Reis, H. T. (2000). Self-disclosure. In A. Kazdin (Ed.), Encyclopedia of psychology, Vol.7. (p. 210). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Russell, D., Peplau, L. A., & Cutrona, C. E. (1980). The revised UCLA Loneliness Scale: Concurrent and discriminant validity evidence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 472-480.
Stokes, J. P. (1987). The relation of loneliness and self-disclosure. In V. Derlega and J. Berg (Ed.), Self-disclosure: Theory, research and therapy (pp. 175-201). New York: Plenum Press.
Young, J. (1982). Loneliness, depression, and cognitive therapy: Theory and application. In L. Peplau & D. Perlman (Ed.), Loneliness: A sourcebook of current theory, research and therapy. (pp. 379-405). New York: Wiley.
Figure 1. Model of hesitancy toward and motivation for self-disclosure to loneliness.
Table 1. Means and Standard Deviations of Ratings on all Factors By Sex (N = 235)
Figure 2. Path diagram of the effect of hesitancy toward and the motivation for self-disclosure on loneliness (* p < .01)
Table 2. Correlation of All Factors
Acknowledgement is due to reviewers including
Dr. Fé
lix Neto
Faculdade de Psicologia e de Cienoias da Edú
caç
ao
Universidade do Porto
Portugal.