Social Media Disclosure Ecology: Understanding the Dynamics of Distress Disclosure on Social Media

Zhang, Renwen

doi:https://doi.org/10.21985/n2-9d8s-5185

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Social Media Disclosure Ecology: Understanding the Dynamics of Distress Disclosure on Social Media

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As social media are intricately woven into the fabric of everyday life, people are increasingly expressing their emotions, feelings, and thoughts on these platforms. Particularly, social media have become an outlet for sharing negative emotions and stressful experiences. This dissertation examines factors that influence how and why people share negative emotions on social media. Drawing on existing literature on self-disclosure, I propose a model for understanding distress disclosure on social media, examining how personal, interpersonal, technological, and sociocultural factors influence distress disclosure on social media, as well as the interplay of these factors. I introduce the concept of social media disclosure ecology, which refers to the dynamic interrelationships between factors that shape disclosure behavior on social media, as an analytical lens to understand online disclosure and privacy. To achieve my research goals, this dissertation presents two studies using data gathered through online survey (N = 470) and semi-structured interviews (N = 20). Findings of these studies demonstrate the pivotal roles that perceived affordances, relational closeness to audience, and online norms play in affecting distress disclosure on social media, highlighting the interactions between these factors. I also showcase the shifting norm of emotional expressions on social media during the COVID-19 pandemic, and how this norm influence individuals’ decisions and strategies of distress disclosure. As an emerging and rapidly evolving situation, COVID serves as a larger context for this research. This research advances the work on online disclosure and privacy in three significant ways. First, it brings together various factors predictive of online disclosure and identifies the most potent factors in the context of distress disclosure, providing a multifaceted view of online disclosure. Second, this research empirically examines the interplay of factors influencing online disclosure, thereby advancing our understanding of the contextual, contingent, and dynamic nature of online disclosure. And finally, the research draws from findings on online disclosure and privacy from various disciplines and thus represents a step toward fostering interdisciplinary work on this subject.

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