Summary: Men are less likely than women to share negative information, while both genders share positive news similarly.
The research suggests that men’s concern about perception leads to selective self-promotion. Conducting three experiments with over 1,000 participants, the study delves into gender-specific disclosure patterns in the digital age.
The findings show women feel more satisfied with their level of disclosure, while men tend to withhold information.
Key Facts:
- The study found that men are less inclined to share negative experiences, possibly due to concerns about social perception.
- Over 1,000 participants in three experiments revealed that both genders are equally likely to share positive information.
- The research indicates that women generally feel more satisfied with their level of disclosure compared to men.
Source: City University London
A new study from Carnegie Mellon University, Bayes Business School (formerly Cass), and Bocconi University has found that men are less eager and likely to share negative information than women, while there was little difference when it comes to positive news.
Published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, the authors suggest that this may be due to a greater concern among men over how other people will see them, resulting in a tendency to self-promote by sharing positive information about themselves and not revealing their negative experiences to others.
Dr Erin Carbone, Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Social and Decision Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University and first author of the study, said: “The results from our studies revealed a consistent, and to the best of our knowledge not previously identified, nuanced pattern, wherein the tendency for women to disclose more than men depends crucially on the nature of the information shared.
“These findings can help make sense of the existing literature, as well as clarify some existing stereotypes, around gender differences in disclosure.”
Sharing in the digital age
Most of the existing research on gender differences and information sharing predates the internet. Given that we live in a world where people readily post information on a variety of platforms on a daily basis, this new study offers insights into the way we share, as well as the consequences of sharing, in the digital age.
To explore gender differences in the sharing of different types of information, the researchers carried out three different experiments with over 1,000 people. In the first study, people self-reported times when they felt like they were “dying” to disclose information to others, then indicated whether they actually had shared the information.
Although men and women generated similar numbers of instances of wanting to share positive information (e.g., about a promotion), men were far less likely to report wanting to share negative information (e.g., a failure to receive a promotion).
Two further studies enabled the team to quantify the desire to disclose and aggregate participants’ desire as well as their propensity to disclose positive or negative information about different topics and experiences.
Disclosure patterns
The study also found that women reported greater satisfaction than men with their own level of disclosure, whereas most male participants reported a greater propensity to withhold information about their thoughts and feelings even when it might have been better to share it with others.
Professor Irene Scopelliti, Professor of Marketing and Behavioural Science at Bayes Business School (formerly Cass) and one of the authors of the study, said:
“Disclosure is increasingly prevalent and permanent in the digital age. The advent of social media and digital communication channels has enabled unprecedented levels of information sharing, which is accompanied by an array of social and psychological consequences.
“Our results show that gender remains an important fault line when it comes to the desire and propensity to disclose negative information, and men may be differentially advantaged by, or vulnerable to, the consequences of information sharing compared to women.”
About this psychology research news
Author: George Wigmore
Source: City University London
Contact: George Wigmore – City University London
Image: The image is credited to Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access.
“He said, she said: Gender differences in the disclosure of positive and negative information” by Erin Carbone et al. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
Abstract
He said, she said: Gender differences in the disclosure of positive and negative information
Research on gender differences in (self-)disclosure has produced mixed results, and, where differences have emerged, they may be an artifact of the measures employed. The present paper explores whether gender – defined as self-identified membership in one’s sociocultural group – can indeed account for differences in the desire and propensity to divulge information to others.
We additionally identify a possible moderator for such differences. In three studies employing two distinct research approaches – a free recall task for the extreme desire to disclose (Study 1, N = 195) and scaled responses to scenarios that manipulate valence experimentally in an exploratory study (Study 2, N = 547) and a preregistered replication (Study 3, N = 405) – we provide evidence of a robust interaction between gender and information valence.
Male participants appear similar to female participants in their desire and likelihood to disclose positive information but are less likely than women to want to share negative information with others, and less likely to ultimately act on that desire.
Men are reportedly more motivated than women to disclose as a means of self-enhancement, and self-reports reveal that women perceive their sharing behavior to be relatively normative, while men believe themselves to be more withholding than what is optimal. Information disclosure is increasingly pervasive and permanent in the digital age, and is accompanied by an array of social and psychological consequences.
Given their disparate disclosing behaviors, men and women may thus be differentially advantaged by, or susceptible to, the positive and negative consequences of information sharing.
