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Cited by 97Privacy, Security, and Data ProtectionTechnology Adoption and User BehaviourImpact of Technology on Adolescents

Privacy Concerns and Self-Disclosure in Private and Public Uses of Social Media

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Gruzd, Anatoliy, Hernández-García, Ángel·2018·Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking
DOI 10.1089/cyber.2017.0709PMC PMC6719399

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Abstract

The study contributes to the ongoing debate about the "privacy paradox" in the context of using social media. The presence of a privacy paradox is often declared if there is no relationship between users' information privacy concerns and their online self-disclosure. However, prior research has produced conflicting results. The novel contribution of this study is that we consider public and private self-disclosure separately. The data came from a cross-national survey of 1,500 Canadians. For the purposes of the study, we only examined the subset of 545 people who had at least one public account and one private account. Going beyond a single view of self-disclosure, we captured five dimensions of self-disclosure: Amount, Depth, Polarity, Accuracy, and Intent; and two aspects of privacy concerns: concerns about organizational and social threats. To examine the collected data, we used Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling. Our research does not support the presence of a privacy paradox as we found a relationship between privacy concerns from organizational and social threats and most of the dimensions of self-disclosure (even if the relationship was weak). There was no difference between patterns of self-disclosure on private versus public accounts. Different privacy concerns may trigger different privacy protection responses and, thus, may interact with self-disclosure differently. Concerns about organizational threats increase awareness and accuracy while reducing amount and depth, while concerns about social threats reduce accuracy and awareness while increasing amount and depth.

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  • It is increasingly common for social media users to create all private accounts or to have separate private and public accounts.

    “It is increasingly more common for social media users either to create all private accounts or to have separate private and public accounts.17–19”

    From Evaluating perceptions of social media professionalism by healthcare workers (2026) · cites this paper as [17]

    The Conclusion (page unavailable) discusses users with both private and public accounts, supporting the existence of separate accounts. The paper does not establish that this arrangement is becoming more common, or that users increasingly create only private accounts. (LLM, conf=0.84)

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Research works printed but not linked: 11

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Authors
Gruzd, A., & Hernández-García, Á.
Affiliations
  • Toronto Metropolitan University (CA)
  • Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (ES)
Corresponding author
Gruzd, Anatoliy
ORCID
Venue
Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking
Publisher
SAGE Publications
Published
2018-07-01
Volume
21
Issue
7
Pages
418-428
ISSN
  • 2152-2715 (ISSN-L)
  • 2152-2723
DOI
10.1089/cyber.2017.0709
PMC
PMC6719399
OpenAlex
W2820695984
Cited by
97
References
50
Citations by year
2026: 17 · 2025: 18 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 16 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 16 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 5
FWCI
16.46
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Cyberpsychology Behavior and Social Networking (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Funders
Canada Research Chairs
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Privacy, Security, and Data Protection
  • Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Information Systems and Management › Technology Adoption and User Behaviour
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Impact of Technology on Adolescents
Keywords
privacy paradox, data privacy concerns, self-disclosure, social media, organizational threats, social danger, disclosure accuracy, disclosure depth
MeSH terms
Adult, Canada, Confidentiality, Female, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Self Disclosure, Privacy, Intention, Young Adult, Social Media

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