Revealing only the superficial me: Exploring categorical self-disclosure online

Despite previous research demonstrating that online self-disclosure occurs in an accelerated manner compared to offline interactions, little is known about the content of online disclosures. This study highlights a number of issues that arise when exploring the self-disclosure of different types of personal information in initial general online communications. Forty-eight students and 48 non-students completed a purpose-developed attitude towards online relationship formation questionnaire and Magno’s (2009) self-disclosure for beliefs, relationships, personal matters, interests and intimate feelings questionnaire. Findings suggest that people are more likely to self-disclose information online the more positive is their attitude towards forming relationships online. Moreover, this self-disclosure initially occurs only for superficial self-information relating to personal matters and interests, implying that it is the quantity of online exchanges that is enhanced rather than the quality thereof. These findings raise a number of issues relating to type of self-information disclosed online, as well as intent, Internet arena, social identity, privacy, trust, and general methodological issues that would benefit from further experimental exploration. Implications of the findings for future research to explore categorical self-disclosure online within an existing theoretical framework of self-categorisation and self-identity theory as well as the self-memory-system model of autobiographical memory are discussed.

Research highlights
► We show online self-disclosure to be an exchange of superficial self-information in general communications.
► Self-disclosure can be mapped onto the controlled and hierarchical processing of self-information in the Self-memory-system model.
► Self-disclosure might vary according to Internet arena.
► Attitudes towards online relationship formation need more consideration in many areas of online research.