Journal of Education and Psychology

Abstract

The aims of this research were to investigate the sex differences and the impacts of deindividuation and intimacy of topics on self-disclosure based on survey and experimental methods. 61 male and 92 female college students participated in study 1 with a pre-and-post test survey. Cross-legged panel analysis showed that individuals’ self-disclosure for sexual topics were consistent between realistic settings and the cyberspace. The consistency between two disclosing settings was quite stable. These findings implicate that cyberspace is not the way of compensation or alternative gratification for realistic settings on sexual topics. As to sex differences, the width of self-disclosure for sexual topics on men was greater than on women’s in realistic settings and this kind of sex differences was more prominent in cyberspace. The depth of self-disclosure for sexual topics of men was greater than women’s in both real settings and the cyberspace. With regard to the impact of deindividuation, the greater the deinviduation of individual’s identity was, the higher the intent of self-disclosure for sexual topics was. Findings of the impact of intimacy on reply intent indicated that the higher the intimacy of topics, the higher the reply intents. Study 2 was conducted with an experimental method. 105 male and 110 female college students participated in this study. Results in study 2 showed that there was no sex difference on reply intent for sexual topics in the cyberspace. The influence of deindividuation on reply intent was similar to the finding obtained with a survey method. Furthermore, the impact of intimacy on reply intent was moderated by deindividuation. The greater the deindividuation of individual’s identity was, the impact of intimacy of topics on reply intent was more pronounced.

_{[Chinese Version | Index | Journal of Education and Psychology | Other Journals | Subscription form | Enquiry ]}

Mail any comments and suggestions to hkier-journal@cuhk.edu.hk .