Thinking Through Secrets: Rethinking the Role of Thought Suppression in Secrecy

Slepian, Michael L.; Greenaway, Katharine H.; Masicampo, E. J.

doi:10.1177/0146167219895017

Cited by 22 publications

(67 citation statements)

References 57 publications

(135 reference statements)

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“…Aside from how much people conceal their secrets, the more frequently their minds return to thoughts of their secrets, the more they report those secrets as hurting their well-being . This effect has been found across a diverse variety of secrets, multiple measures of well-being, and with multiple participant populations, including a multi-international sample hailing from 30 different countries (McDonald et al, 2020;Slepian, Greenaway & Masicampo, 2020;Slepian & Moulton-Tetlock, 2019). Cognitive preoccupation has been shown to be one of the clearest harms of secrecy (see also Davis et al, 2020;Maas et al, 2012;Slepian et al, 2015).…”

Section: F Repetitive Thinkingmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…If a secret is of high significance, the mind should more frequently wander toward it. Indeed, there is empirical evidence for this link Slepian, Greenaway & Masicampo, 2020;Slepian, Kirby & Kalokerinos, 2020;Slepian & Moulton-Tetlock, 2019).…”

Section: Secrecymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…When the external demands of an environment are low, the mind is likely to wander from the external environment (Klinger, 1987(Klinger, , 2013, and many cues can be reminders of a secret. When one finds value in engaging further with the thought, then one's mindwandering toward a secret may take extended forms (Slepian, Greenaway & Masicampo, 2020). That is, people will engage with thoughts of their secrets (Figure 1, E).…”

Section: E Engaging With Thoughts Of Secretsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If one has a secret and is not discussing it with others, then the only way to make progress on the secret is to think through it on one's own. Indeed, the more significant the secret, the more people seek to engage with thoughts of their secret (Slepian, Greenaway & Masicampo, 2020).…”

Section: E Engaging With Thoughts Of Secretsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A process model of having and keeping secrets.

Slepian¹

2022

Psychological Review

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Secrecy is a common and consequential human experience, and yet the literature lacks an integrative theoretical model that captures this broad experience. Whereas initial research focused on concealment (an action a person may take to keep a secret), recent literature documents the broader experience of having a secret. For instance, even if a secret is not being concealed in the moment, one's mind can still wander to thoughts of the secret with consequences for well-being. Integrating several disparate literatures, the present work introduces a new model of secrecy. Rather than define secrecy as an action (active concealment), the model defines secrecy as an intention to keep information unknown by one or more others. Like any other intention, secrecy increases sensitivity to internal or external cues related to the intention. Critically, secret-relevant thoughts are cued in one of two broad contexts: (a) during a social interaction that calls for concealment, and (b) the situations outside of those social interactions, where concealment is not required. Having a secret come to mind in these two very different situations evokes a set of distinct processes and outcomes. Concealment (enacting one's secrecy intention) predicts monitoring, expressive inhibition, and alteration, which consumes regulatory resources and may result in lower interaction quality. Mind-wandering to the secret (when concealment is not required) involves passively thinking about the content of the secret. Engagement with these thoughts may lead to repetitive thinking and rumination, reflection on how one feels about the secret, efforts to cope, or specific plans for how to handle the secret. The model brings together a number of literatures with implications for secrecy, identity concealment, relationships, mind-wandering, coping, health and well-being.

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Section: F Repetitive Thinkingmentioning

confidence: 96%

Section: Secrecymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: E Engaging With Thoughts Of Secretsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: E Engaging With Thoughts Of Secretsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A process model of having and keeping secrets.

Slepian¹

2022

Psychological Review

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“…The consistency of our results across samples suggests that, across age and secret topics, frequently ruminating about a secret in a way that elicits negative emotion is detrimental to people's well‐being. Thus, the thought processes that underlie keeping a secret are a key factor behind the degree to which secrecy creates distress and negative emotion (Richards & Sillars, 2014; Slepian et al, 2020).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What you don't know might hurt me: Keeping secrets in interpersonal relationships

Bedrov

Leary

2021

Personal Relationships

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Despite being an inherently interpersonal phenomenon, secrecy has rarely been studied within specific relationships. This study examines how the secret‐keeper's relationship with the target relates to concealment among undergraduates (n = 292) and MTurk workers (n = 249). Participants rated keeping a personal secret as more detrimental to well‐being when it involved greater concealment difficulty, rumination, and negative affect. For MTurk workers, this burden was compounded when the information was directly relevant to the target. Across both samples, participants in higher quality relationships kept their secrets to avoid shame or relationship damage and perceived less distance from the target. These results demonstrate that the motivations for and consequences of keeping secrets vary with the specific relationships in which they are kept.

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When secrets come to mind: Preoccupation, suppression and engagement

Davis,

Wright,

McMillan

2023

Euro J Social Psych

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When secrets come to mind, do people try to suppress them or do they engage with them? Whereas earlier research suggested that people try to suppress secrets, recent work suggests that people often engage with their secrets. Although thought suppression tends to be associated with greater distress, engagement may be ameliorative. In two longitudinal studies of 653 adults (55% women; Mage = 41.3, SD = 12.4) keeping a secret from their partner, we show that engagement with and suppression of secrets are highly positively related. Like suppression, the more people engage with secrets, the more negative affect and guilt they report feeling. Longitudinal analyses indicate that whereas changes over time in engagement and suppression both predicted reduced secret preoccupation, reductions in suppression (but not engagement) mediated reductions in guilt and negative affect. These results indicate that suppression and engagement are more intimately connected than previously thought. We found no evidence that engagement was ameliorative.

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Thinking Through Secrets: Rethinking the Role of Thought Suppression in Secrecy

Cited by 22 publications

References 57 publications

A process model of having and keeping secrets.

A process model of having and keeping secrets.

What you don't know might hurt me: Keeping secrets in interpersonal relationships

When secrets come to mind: Preoccupation, suppression and engagement

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