Effect Of Shyness And Psychological Security On Self-Disclosure Of College Students

People are carrying on various kinds of interpersonal communication and establishing various kinds of interpersonal relations in every day life.Self-disclosure,as an important and unneglectable behavior in interpersonal communication,refers to the process in which individuals voluntarily display their behaviors and express their thoughts in front of others when communicating with others.College students are in the early adulthood,facing the conflict between intimacy and loneliness.Self-disclosure plays an important role in the formation and development of intimate interpersonal relations,social adaptability and physical and mental health.According to the Person-Context Interaction theory and Person-Environment Transactional Model,the occurrence of individual self-disclosure is the result of the interaction between individual traits and environmental factors.Therefore,this study selects shyness as the individual factor and selects psychological security as the environmental factor to explore the individual effects and interaction effects of these two variables on self-disclosure of college students.In addition,for self-disclosure,this study also makes a detailed investigation from the perspective of self-disclosure content and self-disclosure object.On the basis of relevant theories and empirical research,this study combines relevant research and experimental research to investigate the self-disclosure of college students,mainly including two studies.In study 1,Cheek and Buss Shyness Scale,the Security Scale and Adolescent and Peer Self-disclosure Questionnaire are used to investigate the association between shyness,psychological security(trait)and self-disclosure,and the moderator role of psychological security on the association between shyness and self-disclosure.In study 2,the Psychological Security Recalling Initiation Task,the List of Self-disclosure Subject Questions,the Self-disclosure Validity Scale and the Self-disclosure Information Scale are choosed as the research tools to investigate the association between shyness,psychological security(status)and self-disclosure,which including 3 experiments.Experiment 1 explores theindividual effects and interaction effect of shyness and psychological security(status)on self-disclosure by a between group design of 2(shyness: high vs low)× 2(psychology security: high vs low).Experiment 2 explores the individual effects and interaction effects of shyness,psychological security(status)and interpersonal distance with disclosure object(familiar vs strange)by a between group design of 2(shyness: high vs low)× 2(psychology security: high vs low)× 2(interpersonal distance with disclosure object: familiar vs strange).Experiment 3 explores the individual effects and interaction effects of shyness,psychological security(status),gender and gender consistency with disclosure object(consistent vs inconsistent)on self-disclosure by a between group design of 2(shyness: high vs low)× 2(psychology security: high vs low)× 2(gender: boy vs girl)× 2(gender consistency with disclosure object: consistent vs inconsistent).Finally,this study draws the following conclusions:(1)Shyness affects self-disclosure of college students;high shyness predicts high self-disclosure of college students.Psychological security(trait)moderates the association between shyness and self-disclosure;high level of psychological security(trait)buffers the negative effect of high shyness on self-disclosure.(2)Psychological security(status)affects self-disclosure of college students;high level of psychological security(status)improves self-disclosure of college students.Shyness and psychological security have an interaction on self-disclosure;high level of psychological security(status)improves self-disclosure of high-shy college students.(3)Interpersonal distance with disclosure object(familiar vs strange)affects self-disclosure of college students;students’ self-disclosure to acquaintances is significantly higher than that to strangers.Shyness and interpersonal distance with disclosure object have an interaction on self-disclosure;high-shy college students’ self-disclosure to acquaintances was significantly higher than that to strangers.Psychological security(status)and interpersonal distance with disclosure object have an interaction to self-disclosure of college students;under the condition of high psychological security(status),college students’ self-disclosure to strangers was significantly higher than that of low psychological security(status).Shyness,psychological security(status)and interpersonal distance with disclosure object have an interaction on self-disclosure;high level of psychological security(status)improves self-disclosure of high-shy college students to acquaintances.(4)Gender(boy vs girl)affects self-disclosure of college students;self-disclosure of girls is significantly higher than that of boys.Gender consistency with disclosure object(consistent vs inconsistent)affects self-disclosure of college students;students’ self-disclosure to gender-consistent objects is significantly higher than to gender-inconsistent objects.Psychological security(status)and gender consistency with disclosure object have an interaction on self-disclosure;under the condition of high psychological security(status),students’ self-disclosure to gender-consistent objects is significantly higher than to gender-inconsistent objects.Shyness,psychological security(status)and gender consistency with disclosure object have an interaction on self-disclosure;under the condition of low psychological security(status),high-shy students’ self-disclosure to gender-consistent objects was significantly higher than that to gender-inconsistent objects.