A study of factors that influence self-disclosure and change of real-ideal self discrepancies

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explain self-disclosure intimacy and change of real-ideal self discrepancies using levels of objective self-awareness (OSA), interviewer feedback, real-ideal self discrepancies, following Duval & Wicklund's theory of objective self-awareness (1972). 56 female subjects were divided into groups of either high or low levels of discrepancies by pretest. Subjects were exposed to either their own tape-recorded voices (high OSA) or another's voice (low OSA) before disclosing on a series of topics given by a interviewer. The interviewer responded either in an accepting or a non-accepting manner to the subjects. The experiment showed that (1) high levels of OSA resulted in more intimate disclosure in response to accepting interviewer than to non-accepting interviewer feedback, but low levels of OSA did not. (2) The change of real-ideal self discrepancies amomg the low levels of discrepancy group was not affected by any variables in this experiment. However, among the high levels of discrepancy group, high OSA led to increasing discrepancies in the case of non-accepting interviewer feedback.