Are there special effects of personalistic self-disclosure?

Abstract

Subjects met with a parteer who either did or did not disclose stigmatizing information about himself. Prior to meeting the partner, subjects saw and heard the partner describe himself to two others. These previous descriptions either did or did not include the stigma disclosure. The personalistic discloser was the partner who disclosed only to the subject. He was better liked than the uniform nondiscloser. Surprisingly, the partner who disclosed to others but not to the subject was as well liked as the personalistic discloser. Subjects were also asked to describe themselves to their partner. Subject self-disclosure tended to be least when the partner omitted mention of the stigma. The tendency to reciprocate in the other conditions was revealed by the quantity of disclosure rather than the depth of its intimacy. © 1976.