Self-disclosure and anxiety change

Abstract

This paper presents an analogue study of self-disclosure therapy. Change in anxiety self-report was examined in relation to two variables extracted from Mowrer's theory of neurosis and therapy. One variable consisted of instructions to disclose only negative personal traits or instructions to disclose only positive ones. The other variable consisted of conveying information to subjects that the disclosures would be examined by a person of significance to them or by a person of no significance. The negative disclosure instructions produced significant decrements in subsequent anxiety self-report relative to positive instructions. It was suggested that the absence of an effect associated with the second variable tends to disconfirm Mowrer's contention that “significant others” must be involved in productive therapeutic change.