This paper examines the relations between married partners' levels of affective self-disclosure and marital adjustment. Based upon responses to questionnaires by 324 married students, marital adjustment was found to be positively related to both spouse's reported self-disclosure of feelings and to self's reported reception of affective disclosure. In addition, the relationship between the differences in partners' levels of disclosure and marital adjustment was also examined. Findings indicated that one's perception of differences between self and other in the disclosure of love was inversely related to one's marital adjustment. Situations in which these general findings vary by the type of feeling disclosed—love, happiness, anger, and sadness—are also noted.It is commonly accepted that breakdowns in communication are related to disturbance and
Based upon the analysis of 331 student responses to questionnaires and observation of 48 student behavioral performances, an assessment was made as to how emotional expressiveness is affected by sex of participant, type of feeling, participant role, and sex of best friend. Results indicated that across other situational factors, females were more expressive than males, persons were more expressive of positive emotions than of negative emotions, persons were , more expressive in the initiator role than in the respondent role, and persons were more expressive to opposite-sex rather than same-sex best friends. Differences between these findings and those of previous research were discussed. In addition, the results indicated that university students have difficulty expressing their emotions even under maximal performance conditions; implications for counselors working with this population are discussed.
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