Self-Disclosure in Social Media: Extending the Functional Approach to Disclosure Motivations and Characteristics on Social Network Sites

Abstract

This article introduces the functional model of self‐disclosure on social network sites by integrating a functional theory of self‐disclosure and research on audience representations as situational cues for activating interpersonal goals. According to this model, people pursue strategic goals and disclose differently depending on social media affordances, and self‐disclosure goals mediate between media affordances and disclosure intimacy. The results of the empirical study examining self‐disclosure motivations and characteristics in Facebook status updates, wall posts, and private messaging lend support to this model and provide insights into the motivational drivers of self‐disclosure on SNSs, helping to reconcile traditional views on self‐disclosure and self‐disclosing behaviors in new media contexts.

Age differences in privacy attitudes, literacy and privacy management on Facebook

“…While we focused on Facebook because it is among the most commonly used SNS platforms, recent studies indicate that SNS platforms vary significantly in terms of the affordances they create for selective management of information sharing activities (Bazarova & Choi, 2014). Further research may investigate how differences in these affordances may influence the relationship between age, disclosure and use of privacy protective measures.…”

"Leadership in Action: How Top Hackers Behave" A Big-Data Approach with Text-Mining and Sentiment Analysis

“…Often average message length for each message is used as a covariate [17] [38]. We find that relatively lengthy messages deliver more cognitive value and are far more important to the larger audience of the community -be it a hacker forum or an CQA such as StackOverflow [10] [52] [53].…”

Information Re-Sharing on Social Network Sites in the Age of Fake News

“…Consistent with TPB, self-disclosure intentions are influenced by perceived benefit, perceived risk, privacy concerns, information control, and sensitivity (Xu, Michael, & Chen, 2013). Other motivating factors for information disclosure include internet trust, personal internet interest (Dinev & Hart, 2006), social validation, self-expression, relational development (Bazarova & Choi, 2014), and entertainment (Utz, 2015). Privacy-related factors such as privacy concerns, privacy attitudes, and privacy practices have been cited as primary inhibitors of self-disclosure behavior (Chen, 2013;Tschersich & Botha, 2013;Zlatolas, Welzer, Heričko, & Hölbl, 2015).…”