Self-Disclosure, Gender and Communication Self-

Self-Disclosure, Gender and Communication

Self- Disclosure, Gender and Communication

The article "Can we talk? Researcher talks about the role of communication in happy marriages" written by Schoenberg is an article which describes the importance of self-disclosure in relationships. The author has explained importance of self-disclosure by giving the reference of a research that was performed by ForgetDinner.co.uk. It was found out in the research that a 50 years old couple talks hardly for three minutes in an hour dinner.

Although this seems sad and gives impression that the husband wife does not any interest in each other but according to the relationship expert, Terri Orbuch, it is not the quantity but the quality that matters (Schoenberg, 2011). It is not important how many minutes' couples talk, what matters is what they talk. Sometimes the couples talk for hours but they only discuss about their children, family issues, money, grocery, home utilities and other things, which are not directly related to them. All of these issues might be important in their lives but are not necessary for their relationship. When talking about all issues they are only discussing about others and not about themselves; which means their relation is lacking self-disclosure.

Self-disclosure means to express and to share happiness, feelings, dreams, wishes and also fears, problems & weaknesses. Couples must know that sharing feelings and problems is not considered as a weakness. It actually brings couples closer to each other and they live a happy and supporting life understanding each other's happiness and problems.

In my opinion self-disclosure is very important in order to maintain a happy life as it plays a critical role in giving satisfaction in relationships. Talking for hours but do not expressing the inner feelings keeps the couple far from each other. People also talk to neighbors and colleagues for hours but than what is the difference between the two? The difference is that we can share everything with our life partner that we cannot with anyone else; not even with our old friends.

It is observed in studies that women disclose more compared to husbands who do not. This is maybe because of our culture in which woman is encouraged to show her feelings and men are required to hide their feelings or weaknesses (Pleck and Sawyer, 1974). However, men must not hide their feelings from their wives, in fact, they should discuss with them and wives should help husband to express, as men are usually less expressive.

Expressing and knowing your partner is very essential in order to maintain a strong and never-ending married life relationship. Self-disclosure allow couples to reduce the uncertainty about each other; as a result bit by bit couples come closer and start discussing very personal life stories (Sole, 2011). Terri Orbuch (Schoenberg, 2011) also says that a romantic relationship begins with lots of sharing and excitement. This sharing can be from telling a favorite dish to disclosing the most secret story of the past.