Being empathic and self-disclosing might be too much: A study on the interplay of self-disclosing and empathic language on person perception in online forums.

Thon F M, Jucks R

Abstract

People exchange information and seek advice from peers more and more online. In written computer mediated communication (CMC) cues to intentions and attitudes of interlocutors are lacking, thus, word choice and linguistic expression become central in gathering information about the sender of information. There is broad evidence for effects of self-disclosing and empathic behavior on person perception in face-to-face communication. In CMC, however, less is known on how valid recipients assess a senders’ personality based on the given information.How sensitive do recipients react to specific language cues in a forum discussion? Participants (n = 213) rated how self-disclosing and empathic a forum user is, based on his forum message in a 2 (self-disclosing language yes versus no) x 2 (empathic language yes versus no) between subjects design. Results show that recipients are able to link language cues correctly to the underlying characteristics when presented solely. The interaction effect points to problems in keeping track of what information was included in the message: Self-disclosure was rated lower when self-disclosing and empathic language was used compared to the condition that provided only self-disclosing information. Implications for person perception in CMC will be discussed.