Revealing Mental Health Information in Friendships: The Role of Disclosure Strategy and Perceived Recipient Response on Disclosure Outcomes

ABSTRACT

Processes of revealing, or disclosures, take various forms, and are sometimes referred to as disclosure strategies. How individuals share information influences how recipients respond, which may have important consequences that shape perceptions of the overall interaction and relationship satisfaction. This research explores mental health disclosures among friends to understand how (a) one’s disclosure strategy predicts their perceptions of the recipient response, (b) perceived recipient response predicts perceptions of disclosure outcomes, and (c) perceived recipient response potentially mediates the relationships between disclosure strategies and disclosure outcomes (e.g., interaction success, relationship satisfaction). Participants were 144 individuals who had disclosed their mental health condition to a friend. Analyses revealed that when disclosing mental health information to a friend, strategy use was, in part, predictive of perceived recipient response which, in turn, predicted discloser’s ratings of disclosure outcomes. This manuscript discusses implications of findings and suggests directions for future research.

Notes

1. Friendship was defined broadly and could include other types of close relationships. Although most participants identified the relationship to the receiver as traditional friendship, friends (n = 123), others included significant others (n = 10), family members (n = 4), roommates (n = 3), others (n = 1) and three participants did not respond.

2. Detailed information about the two phases of recruitment are available from the first author.

3. The significance level was set to p = .05. Results can be obtained by contacting the first author.

4. The remaining sample identified as: Asian (n = 26, 18.2%), Hispanic or Latino (n = 5, 3.5%), Black/African American (n = 2, 1.4%), or Other (n = 4, 2.8%); one did not respond.

5. Participants provided details of their mental health condition in an open-ended question and could report more than one illness. Thus, percentages total greater than 100%. Category designations were made using the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) groupings for mental health conditions (National Alliance on Mental Illness, 2012).