February 1, 2015
Social Penetration Theory
In September of my freshman year, one of the girls I had just met at the beginning of the year asked me about my love life before we watched a movie. I felt extremely uncomfortable and basically just said that I was single; however, in the month that I had known her, we had talked extensively about the similarities and differences between our high schools. Our two schools were considered "sister schools," yet neither of us really knew anything about the other's school until these discussions took place. We would talk about our school policies, demographics, grading systems and diversity in great details, yet when my friend asked me about my love life, I wasn't having it.
According to the social penetration theory, each topic in our life has a certain breadth and depth on which we are willing to discuss it with people. In this case, I was willing to talk with my friend in great breadth and depth about our high schools. The breadth was wide because we talked about schooling in a variety of contexts, yet the depth was great because we did not stop at the surface of these topics, but continued further into the topics. On the other hand, the breadth and depth of the conversation about my love life was almost nonexistent. I would not tell her about past romances, current love life, or future hopes for my romances.
In this case, I was not willing self disclose much with my friend. According to the social penetration theory, self disclosure leads to intimacy when it is gradual, orderly, and reciprocal. I think that part of my lack in depth dealt with the non-gradual process that my friend tried to talk about my love life. There was no gradual questions about who I was seeing or anything along those lines, but she jumped straight to asking me about my entire love life. Also, it was not reciprocal in that she was only asking for my love life, but never gave me any insight into her own.
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