Socially Desirable Responding and the Target of Disclosure in Relation to Comfort of Disclosure - Lab Report Example

The Effects of Disclosure: Socially Desirable Responding and the Target of Disclosure In Relation to Comfort of Disclosure Student Name Course Name Semester Word Count: 2,000 (8 pages) ABSTRACT The aim of this study was to analyse what the effects of disclosure were, as well as what were socially desired responses as well as who was targeted for disclosure—all in relation to peoples’ comfort level in total disclosure. Disclosure is loosely defined as how much a person is willing to reveal, either in private or public communications. There were multiple, varying elements that had an effect on what the results ultimately were. The effects of disclosure were clear-cut. The evidence seemed to suggest that the more people tended to self-disclose, the more well-liked they were and the more socially desirable responses they evoked. Depending upon who was targeted for disclosure precluded who was most comfortable sharing what information. Scientists have mused whether someone’s level of affability has a positive effect upon how others perceive that person. It seems research may support certain existing effects visible from social conditioning. METHOD Participants The participants were first-year undergraduate psychology students enrolled in an Australian university. There were 128 women (M 30.86 years, SD 11.59) and 36 men (M 29.03 years, SD 11.91). The fact that there were about 4 times the amount of women as there were men in the participation of the study could have had an effect on the skewing of the study to evaluate the habits of women more than men more closely. It is almost entirely possible. This could be considered problematic only if those evaluating the study do not feel that it is an impingement upon one sex’s disclosure habits over and against the other’s. That is somewhat of a discussion for an entirely different focus, but nevertheless the fact remains that a majority of the study participants were women, which is probably going to have some serious biases undoubtedly, if not on the part of the study participants then possibly the researchers, too. This is discussed further at length in the procedure section in terms of how this demographic came about. Materials The materials used in the study include Paulhus’s Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR), which was designed to measure Social Desirability, as well as the Telling Inventory. This research consisted of 28 statements that people might disclose, designed by a research team. The participants were required to rate how positive or negative each of the statements were and how they would feel if the statements were true of them, as well as how comfortable they would feel telling this information to a particular person. This comfort item was crucial for this study, and was rated by the participants on a scale from 1 (very uncomfortable) to 7 (very comfortable) in the disclosure of this information. Socially desirable responding (SDR) was assessed in the survey using Paulhus’s Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR) which has two dimensions – Self Deceptive Enhancement (SDE) and Impression Management (IM). As part of a larger study other measures also collected yet not analysed included a measure of mood (PANAS, Watson et al., 1988), a measure of personality, or mini IPIP and a measure of the perception of trust in faces. Procedure Participants completed an online survey which was accessed via a link on the course website. Much of this could have been random in the sense that participants who were more willing to participate were women. If men were less interested in participating in the study, it begs the question why. To some extent, this was not necessarily the most scientific way to go about gathering information, in terms of being able to have control over who would participate in the study. Online surveys for studies such as this that are hosted by sites like Survey Monkey and the like, are somewhat disreputable because they don’t necessarily take into account demographic information, which is in science can have a lot of impact on why who would act in such a manner towards someone else. This seems like a basic lack of understanding on the part of the researcher. Without knowing who is filling out the survey, some of the knowledge that could have been garnered in the survey was left completely a mystery, leaving one unable to make certain associations without such information. RESULTS Several things can be deduced from the graph. The comfort of disclosure went up drastically when one compared someone who was telling things to a best friend versus someone who was telling things to someone online (such as in telecommunications via social media such as Twitter or Facebook). People lower on the SDE scale were less comfortable disclosing certain facts that could be considered socially undesirable, such as the fact that they had loaned money, shoplifted, or had no children. Consequentially, that seemed to be across the board, whether it happened in the company of good friends or online. However, it seemed that most people were still pretty cautious about what they revealed to their friends or family online via social media, with numbers registering lower on the mean comfort of disclosure level when comparing it to the fact that one could be talking to one’s best friend either in person or on the phone. This research seems to want to say that the more that people are open on social media, perhaps the less that they truly want to share about themselves or the less that they truly might want to be truthful. This indicates that people with a high level of self-deception enhancement feel somewhat more comfortable than people who scored lower on the scale. It is possible that those who consume more social media are fond of deceiving themselves into believing a certain persona they project online. There is a profile photo, some quotes, an about me section—a kind of way to make someone see the world through the eyes of the persona that is created. This is best addressed in the discussion section. DISCUSSION Originally, there were four hypotheses that had to be tested, and they were. The first hypothesis stated that participants would feel more comfortable disclosing on Facebook than to a close friend. This hypothesis was not able to be substantiated with evidentiary support. Therefore, the hypothesis was not supported. The results of the survey showed that participants would obviously feel that they trusted telling their friends something in person rather than via a mode of communication such as via a social media site. Facebook is an interesting place to begin this discussion. That’s definitely a wonderful question, and it definitely deserves further observation. However, that’s not the focus of this research so let’s delve further into what the data is telling us. Hypothesis number two stated that participants with high SDE’s were more comfortable to self-disclose compared to participants with low SDE. Technically this hypothesis was not completely supported since M=3.76 for a high SDE as opposed to M=3.52 for a low SDE). However, since high SDE did score more than low SDE, the hypothesis was supported even though it was only M=0.24. As you can see on the graph, this hypothesis was obviously supported by a preponderance of evidence. On both fronts (whether the person was telling their best friend or telling someone online), whoever wanted to talk was going to talk regardless—because that person scored higher on the self-deception enhancement score. Thus, the hypothesis was indeed supported. The results of the survey concluded that conclusively, and the findings are practically self-evident in this case. The third hypothesis stated that it would be more comfortable to disclose to a friend rather than online about lending money, and next, the inability to bear children—which would be overall more comfortable to disclose than having shoplifted before, irrespective of the target. One of the categories that seemed extremely interesting to note was that high SDE’s were recorded for the inability to bear children. It’s unusual that people would be more comfortable talking about the inability to have children more than loaning money to people, much less shoplifting! This seems like an unusual statistic because the process of having a child can be intensely personal, and not everyone likes the fact that peoples’ everyday lives with and without children in their lives seems to be documented from every possible perspective on social media, and especially Facebook. This hypothesis was obvious in the graph but did not seem to necessarily make a lot of sense. Then again, part of the difficulty with analysing the types of disclosure is that: one deals with money; one is a crime; and one is a (potential) shameful personal situation. These are all situations frought with various types of worry, and it’s not exactly certain—but this could affect the way the entire study was conducted, since the categories don’t exactly seem to match up. The fourth hypothesis was that supposedly, the admission that one could not bear children would be a more bearable admission to make on social media because it is a medical problem that cannot be controlled—unlike shoplifting—which would be within someone’s locus of control to manage, presuming that person didn’t have a psychological condition which precluded him or her from having control. This seems to be supported by the evidence of the graph—technically—but, seeing as how Facebook is such a social phenomena, it’s really hard to believe that it would be easier to tell someone about not being able to have a child than it would be to tell someone about an act of shoplifting one committed in the past, even if it were about something as trivial as stealing a candy bar. That seems difficult to believe. The hypothesis is supported with evidence, but perhaps most participant respondents didn’t want to admit that they would be ashamed that they couldn’t bear children (Osterhof and Todorov, 2008). Let us consider that most of these respondents were women. So, that could play a major role in how the results were tallied. Now, if the study had been equally divided between men and women, this might have been able to give us a better picture of how the study split in terms of the male-female demographic. But since this was a random online survey, one can’t really necessarily completely depend upon the fixed variable, gender, to be fixed because there was no discerning as to whom was filling out the survey—a man or a woman. In conclusion, what seems to be the case is that the effects of disclosure depend largely upon the nature of what is being disclosed. It seems that people who are more apt to talk are going to talk, regardless of what is being said. However, it seems that the nature of the circumstances discussed are what genuinely make disclosure a double-edged sword. People understand when someone is disclosing the fact that they had to loan someone money, but what about when the issue is more personal. It truly does make one think about the nature of how private versus public disclosure is viewed, and whether the nature of these circumstances renders the ethical ramifications of either types of disclosure any less valid. It would be interesting, in a larger discussion, to view how ethics were to play a role in analyzing who discloses what to whom, and why. It is on this note, which we conclude. Hopefully further research can argue on those points. REFERENCES Derrek,G, & Mercy, V (2010). Appropriateness of Self-disclosure. In G. J. Chelune, Self-disclosures: Origins, Patterns and Implications of Openness in Interpersonal Relationships (pp. 151-176). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Evans, Miranda. (2002). Various Models of Socially Desirable Responding. Article of Personality and Social Psychology, pp. 598-609. Forest, A. L., & Wood, J. V. (2012). When Social Media Is Not Working: Individuals With Low Self-Esteem Recognize But Do Not Reap the Benefits of Self-Disclosure on Facebook. Psychological Science, Vol 23 (3), pp. 295-302 DOI: 10.1177/0956797611429709 Greene, K., Derlega, V. J., & Mathews, A. (2006). Self-disclosure in Personal Relationships. In A. L. Vangelisti, & D. Perlman, The Cambridge Handbook of Personal Relationships (pp. 409-427). New York: Cambridge University Press. Edwards , Wayne (2004). Self-Disclosure: The main Experimental Analysis of the Transparent Self. Oxford: John Wiley. Omarzu, Julia 2000, A disclosure decision model: Determining how and when individuals will self-disclose. Personality and Social Psychology Review. vol 4(2) pg 174. http://web.a.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/ehost/detail?sid=d0f49c95-9e66-4bc4-9efb-554340b295c4%40sessionmgr4005&vid=1&hid=4101&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#db=pbh&AN=3319687 Paulhus, D. L. (1984). Two-component Models of Socially Desirable Responding. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 46(3), pp. 598-609 DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.46.3.598 Paulhus, D. L., & Reid, D.B. (1991). Enhancement and Denial in Socially Desirable Responding. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 60(2), pp. 307- 317. DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.60.2.307 Paulhus, D. L. (1991). Measurement and control of response bias. In J. P. Robinson, P. R. Shaver & L. S. Wrightsman (Eds.), Measures of personality and social psychological attitudes (pp. 17-59). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. Read More