Men, and the bearing of bad news…
Friday, December 15, 2023. Travelling up the Northeast Corridor, on my way to Penn Station.
The ability and desire to share intimate and personal information about ourselves is a critical pathway toward achieving authentic intimacy with other humans.
However, breaking research confirms something we already sort of already suspected…men are disinclined to share bad news compared to women, a new study finds.
It means that men are much more likely to keep leave bad outcomes unmentioned, such as not getting an expected promotion at work, but women will often openly discuss not only the bad news, but also how they feel about it.
On the other hand, when it comes to sharing good news, men and women tend to share positive outcomes at the same rate.
Men prefer to be seen as positive and effective…
Sharing information about ourselves is essential in building and deepening our relationships with other humans.
For example, Collins & Miller, discovered way back in 1994:
Humans who are inclined to be vulnerable and disclose intimate their secrets tend to be more liked than those who do not.
Humans also tend to disclose more personal material to humans they like.
Humans have a social preference to other humans with whom they have previously made personal disclosures.
Men’s reluctance to share any bad news in their lives might be explained by a socialized need to be seen as competent and effective. However, being allergic to conveying bad news may make it more difficult for men to connect with their life-partners, (and others), and accept support during a rough patch.
Dr. Erin Carbone, the study’s first author, 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.”
How the study was conducted
This research focused on over 1,000 humans who described a felt need to self-disclose to others and, later on, whether they had in reality, actually done so.
Along with revealing a man’s propensity to remain silent about bad outcomes, this research also revealed that men were less satisfied with their own degree of self-disclosure.
This hints at the possibility that men would prefer to share negative news, but find it challenging to actually follow through.
On the other hand, the women in this study were more satisfied than the men with their levels of self-disclosure about bad news.
Professor Irene Scopelliti, study co-author, elaborated:
“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.”
Understanding essential gender differences, and not pathologizing them in an essential first step in effective couples therapy.
Be well, stay kind, and Godspeed.
RESEARCH:
Erin Carbone, George Loewenstein, Irene Scopelliti, Joachim Vosgerau, He said, she said: Gender differences in the disclosure of positive and negative information, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Volume 110, 2024, 104525, ISSN 0022-1031, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2023.104525. (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103123000823)
Collins, N. L., & Miller, L. C. (1994). Self-disclosure and liking: A meta-analytic review. Psychological Bulletin, 116(3), 457–475. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.116.3.457
