Psychological Effects of Keeping Secrets. Keeping secrets steals our life force, makes us sick, kills relationships, and wastes our creativity. “Secrets exert a gravitational pull on our attention, and it’s the cyclical revisiting of our mistakes that explains the harmful effects that secrets can have on our well-being and relationship satisfaction,” said Malia Mason, co-author of the study and associate professor … During adolescence, keeping secrets from parents is related to greater feelings of autonomy yet also to lower psychological and physical well-being. While it might preserve a friendship, it can also lead to stress, the depletion of cognitive resources and adverse health outcomes (Penebaker, 1990, cited in … Could keeping secrets affect our well-being then? SUBSCRIBE to BrainCraft! He studies the effects of both personal and professional secrets for the individual secret keeper as well as whether we can tell when others are concealing information from us. We know something, but do we tell? “Next, I think it’s important to determine what you need from your partner. Keeping secrets within a marriage, or any significant adult relationship, can cause a breakdown in communication. Keeping secrets takes work and is fatiguing. For some people, a layoff could be a welcome relief from a difficult job situation or looked at as potential for moving on in their life. Spreadeagle. This can lead to inner torment, fatigue, and famously, inadvertent slips when we reveal secret information, often with comedic and sometimes tragic results. Women responded more strongly not only to self-disclosure but also to responsiveness. The Present Research The present article examined whether secrets weigh people down. The truth does set us free. The previously mentioned Columbia University study determined that being secretive is linked to lower overall well-being. Psychology Department, University of Portsmouth, King Henry Building, King Henry 1 Street, Portsmouth PO1 2DY, UK. Despite the dangers, keeping secrets is part of human nature. They also can make us feel more fearful, hostile, and guilty, but the sadness and isolation make us more tired. While she hasn't found a direct link between keeping secrets and being physically sick, she and researchers did find that those who withhold a lot or are "self-concealers" do show anxiety, depression, and overall body aches and pains. Columbia University researchers demonstrated in a study of 13,000 secrets that people may become distracted by secrets, leading to preoccupation with them, decreased feelings of authenticity, and a reduced sense of well-being about satisfaction with one’s life. The fatigue and feelings of isolation that come along with secret-keeping are avoidable, all you have to do is reveal them. That decrease in authenticity led people to feel worse about their life. In fact, John Churton Collins said: “How much consolation we would find if we counted our secrets”. You very well may … Scientific studies have shown that keeping secret affects the emotional and physical well-being of the secret keeper. “The more a secret overlaps with one’s own social network, the more one conceals the secret on the other’s behalf, predicting increased feelings of … Prior theories proposed that keeping secrets hidden is hard work, and over … “The closer one is to the confider, the more one’s mind wanders toward the secret, predicting increased feelings of intimacy, but also burden,” they write in the paper. And they freeze the development on individuals. The truth does set us free. Pointing to the possible mechanism underlying the negative effect of keeping secrets on well-being, Lane and Wegner’s ... or the emotional distress surrounding their secret. The honest truth about keeping secrets. Though revealing the secret yourself will cause pain, having them learn it from someone else will undoubtedly cause even more. How did you feel when you were keeping it? “Anything that a person feels guilty, ashamed, or uncomfortable about certainly has the potential to impact their mental well-being,” says Talkspace therapist Rachel O’Neill, Ph.D. “Individuals may find themselves exerting a great deal of effort to hide the secret, which may come at the expense of their ability to enjoy life. The general concept of secrecy, the keeping and revealing of secrets, curiosity and the search to discover the secret hidden aspects of other people's lives and nature in general are subjects about which little has appeared in the psychoanalytic literature. Slepian’s study is just the most recent to look at the effects of secrets. The Psychology Behind Why We Keep Secrets. What are the effects of keeping secrets? But for others a job loss can have a significant emotional impact. Recent Articles The last two experiments looked deeper into the details of emotion and motivational conflict. One of the main reasons for the negative effect on energy level and performance is because secrets make us feel lonely and sad. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of keeping secrets on quality of life in older adults. Keeping secrets can destroy relationships. What other emotions does this secret stir up? As Slepian and colleagues note, “Secrecy creates a conflict between the goal to connect with others and the goal to keep the secret information unknown, which manifests in feelings of social isolation and motivational conflict.”. Just know that these psychological effects will diminish to some extent after you leave the club. There is a difference between information that must be kept secret and personal information that we may not have shared but would without fear of consequences if it came up. However, for experiment three, where mitigating private ambition was present behind the secret, fatigue was not higher, although those participants did still report greater feelings of social isolation related to keeping the secret. Characteristics of secrets and the frequency, reasons and effects of secrets keeping and disclosure. Secrets can create a vicious circle of shame, hidden and unquestioned. Psychology studies reveal that secrets are bad for your health—even after you tell them . International Review of Psycho-Analysis, 1:291-296. With some secrets, there is a real conflict between the cost of keeping the secret and the consequences of letting it out, and many other secrets are kept secret under coercion and duress, out of dysfunctional family dynamics, or because of societal norms to deny and suppress inconvenient truths. The exercise of will and vigilance in being careful with what one says uses emotional and cognitive resources and can leave a residue of negative feelings, like guilt. In addition, they showed that secrecy, indirectly via social isolation, reduced both persistence and performance. Effects on the Little Ones. Past empirical work on secrecy has focused on the effects that withholding information in social … Unclassified material. Be straightforward and let your partner know how they can help make the process of sharing a little less difficult for you.”. Is one friend cheating on another, but you don’t know if you should say anything? Despite the dangers, keeping secrets is part of human nature. Ashley Laderer is a writer who aims to break the stigmas surrounding mental illness and make fellow anxiety and depression sufferers feel less alone. These hinder personal serenity, healing, and healthy bonding with others - which lower family-nurturance levels. 4 Reasons Why Listening to Sad Music When You’re Unhappy Doesn’t Make You Weird. briefly held concepts, we examine the effects of a chronic state (a long-held secret) and also consider how individual differences in the psychological burden associated with a secret influence per-ception and behavior. Why is that? Slepian got his start studying secrets … At any given time we are keeping an average of 17 secrets — not our own, but secrets that have been confided in us. In each experiment, online surveys were used to catch a glimpse of a broader population than college students’ psychological research often uses, with 200 participants in each of the first five experiments and 400 in the other two experiments, with the average age in the mid-thirties. They deter new relationships. 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