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     FRIENDSHIP AND SELF-DISCLOSURE. . . . . ..Ch. 7

Chapter 7       FRIENDSHIP AND SELF-DISCLOSURE
Outline of Chapter

Session 7-1  RANGE AND INTENSITY OF FRIENDSHIP NEEDS
     Understanding intimacy as emotional closeness
     Optimum mid-range of intimacy
     Bonding for optimum development (Ashley Montague)
     Asking questions for optimum friendship
     Shyness as intimacy dysfunction (Philip Zimbardo)
     Friendship,  intimacy, sex

Session 7-2  FORCES UNDERMINING INTIMACY
     Isolationist parents inhibiting intimacy
     Marriage conflict hurting child intimacy
     Inferior ego ideals marring intimacy
     Abuse undermining intimacy
     Negative beliefs foil intimacy
     Narcissism damaging intimacy
     Superego and id affecting intimacy
     Obsessive id affecting intimacy
     Love deprivation affecting intimacy
Session 7-3  CONSEQUENCES OF EXCESSIVE ISOLATION
     Rage reactions from non-intimacy
     Chemical dependence from non-intimacy
     Paraphilias from non-intimacy
     Deviance from non-intimacy
     Criminality from non-intimacy

Session 7-4  SELF-DISCLOSURE SKILLS FOR OPTIMUM INTIMACY
     The skill and art of self-disclosure (Sidney Jourard)
     Self-disclosure and the pursuit of truth (Jourard)
     Self-disclosure and sharing feelings (Jourard)
     Self-disclosure and health (Jourard)
     Mutual self-disclosure for intimacy (Jourard)
     Self-disclosure aborting intimacy wars
     Self-disclosure preparing for creativity
     Exercises in self-disclosure
     Role of beliefs in self-disclosure (Jourard)
     Self-disclosure as communication

Session 7-5   INTIMATE SELF-DISCLOSURE IN ROMANCE AND MARRIAGE
     Attraction, self-disclosure and intimacy
     Dating, self-disclosure and intimacy
     Passion, versus Eros, Philos and Agape
     Commitment, Positive Stroking for intimacy
     Long lasting passion and best friend from self-disclosure


SELF – DISCLOSURE,
the sharing of one’s joys and struggles,
GENERATES FRIENDSHIP.

Self-disclosure helps reduce rage, substance abuse,  
deviancy, divorce, criminality, etc.


     Segments of this chapter are especially relevant to show how the willingness and the disclosure of self generates a higher level of friendship, and a reduction of problems. The chapter also helps to define the more helpful expectations and boundaries of dating, romance, intimacy, marriage, sexuality, deviancy and/or divorce. Ashley Montague's concepts of pre-natal emotional warmth and post-natal touching are taught, along with Sidney Jourard's concept of the need for self-disclosure to enhance intimacy and sex. The student will also see the connection psychology makes between increased intimacy and the decrease of deviancy, as well as the decrease in prioritizing object relations over personal relationships.
People have a basic need for intimacy (emotional closeness), which is what we have in deep friendships. Problems increase in persons as they move away from close, intimate and trusting relationships into a lifestyle that is more withdrawing from people. At about age 12 young people begin to reject their dependency upon their parents. Adolescents increase their distancing from parents as they explore new lifestyles and test personal strengths. As adolescents venture forth, experimenting with decision-making, their parents sense a temporary lessening of the emotional closeness that existed in previous years. During those years adolescents experience much isolation and desire more  intimacy. Right at this time, sexual feelings are very strong and often confused with intimacy needs. At the core of humans is a need for close and lasting friendships; for friends who accept, who love, who care. People confuse sex and intimacy, sometimes settling for sex without intimacy. Intimacy is a characteristic of the more optimum set of lifestyle factors. This chapter uses representative psychological research on intimacy from approximately two thousand research projects that dealt with “intimacy,” either wholly or in part, since 1974 (Published abstracts by American Psychological Association are available on two compact disks in libraries, or published in book form for libraries).     
      Intimacy is emotional closeness. What it adds to love and sex makes love and sex even better. Intimacy feelings peak in the mother at the birth of a child. Intimacy bonding, which takes place at birth and in the following months, is a major contributor to long-term mental, physical and relational health.

Session 7-1  RANGE AND INTENSITY OF INTIMACY NEEDS

 The following scientific studies show great personal benefits from optimum levels of close personal relations. In a study of 460 persons (Sisca, Walsh & Walsh, 1985), lower blood pressure was correlated with measures of intimacy. Even under very stressful poverty conditions people who have the greatest amount of intimacy in personal relations are the happiest (Gladow & Ray, 1986). In another survey (McAdams & Bryant, 1987) of 503 men and 694 women, those who had higher scores in  intimacy, were also those who experienced happiness and gratification. Men, in the same study, with higher levels of intimacy, were associated with greater coping and certainty. One psychologist (Porcino, 1985) suggests that the reason for women's increased longevity over men is their “continued capacity for intimacy.” This suggests that intimacy is one of psychology's optimum lifestyle factors.

Understanding intimacy versus isolation

     A number of psychologists have helped identify the instinctual drives for close personal relations. Both Eric Fromm and Karen Horney wrote extensively on the influence of love and intimacy to bring out the best in person. The seven stages of Erikson's model include the 6th stage of isolation-versus-intimacy. This stage, like the 5 stages before it and the 1 after it, are heavily influenced by whether a person is treated decently enough so s/he can “trust”adequately. The models of these three persons suggest that love, intimacy and being treated decently are factors which are needed in order to experience the more optimum lifestyles we all dream about. These factors, and more, enable persons to reach their potential.
     To build closer personal relations, what does a person need or not need? Research is still investigating. Psychologists develop lists. Here is one list. In marital intimacy (Margolin, 1983) the following are needed: (1) “passion,” (2) “play,” (3) “self-disclosure,” (4) “suspension of [wrong] assumptions of fairness.” Some psychologists may not agree with No. 4, because they believe so strongly in justice. In marriages there needs to be more than “fairness.” There needs to be a willingness to give more than to receive, from time to time. Yet, from a practical point of view it is difficult to achieve higher forms of justice, so people may need to “suspend” some fairness-thinking and add forgiveness-thinking to achieve close personal relationships.

     Edward Waring (1984), Victoria Hospital, London, Canada, has developed The Waring Intimacy Questionnaire. In this instrument he seeks to identify 8 facets of close personal relationships: (1) affection, (2) cohesion, (3) conflict resolution, (4) compatibility, (5) expressiveness, (6) sexuality, (7) autonomy, (8) identity. It is apparent that the factors are heavily oriented to couple's intimacy. However, many of the factors would also describe intimacy among friends, peers, work partners, and social acquaintances.  

                  “The chief sources of conflict in the medical marriage
                   (134 physicians and 125 wives) appear to revolve around
                  differences in the partner's needs for intimacy, perceptions
                  of the problems in the marital relationship and in each other,
                   and communication styles.” Glen O. Gabbard, Roy W. Menninger,
                  Lolafaye Coyne,    Menninger Foundation, Topeka, Kansas, 1987

Optimum mid-range of close personal relations

Too much closeness in a relationship may be as much of a problem as too little closeness. An understanding of optimum psychological lifestyles needs to be based on a model that understands wide variance in behavior. People do vary in behavior, but problems seem to occur with more frequency when people move too far left or right from some broad middle ground of behavior. People fluxuate between being strongly intimate with some and not with others. This is normal. However, certain persons can be quite unable or fearful in seeking intimacy, and that causes discomfort and generates distance. Also persons can probably become excessively intimate, excessively self-disclosing or excessively open. We can see some of this in the overbearing person.

 Bonding for development of close relations (Ashley Montague)

     Infants born in a hospital are usually returned to their mothers within minutes after birth, to reinforce the bonding of their emotions. Mothers talk quietly. Babies nuzzle to their mothers. Their eyes look deeply at each other. The baby scans and gazes at the source of warmth and security. They are in love; in one of the deepest emotionally intimate experiences known. In that first hour of life both mother and child are intensely alert and there is a state of ecstasy, an emotional high. The process resembles what we see in lower species and the responses are very biological and psychological. “When it (bonding) is completely denied to parents, the results can be disastrous (Giffin, 1983).” The following story is a composite picture of the kind of case histories wherein one sees a person who has experienced poor bonding in childhood.

     Jess wanted to die. He took an overdose of leftover medicines he had purchased for many past illnesses. At age 19, living he thought, was worse than dying. Jess had been unhappy since childhood. He was adopted at age 4 by parents who had 2 active and responsible children. Jess never felt he fit in. Jess was defiant. Jess broke rules the others obeyed. He disliked school, frequently skipped classes and was expelled often. All of this produced a cycle of parent-child blame and conflict. At age 17 Jess investigated his adoption and found his mother. In one of the visits he learned that his mother was extremely ashamed of the pregnancy and left town for months prior to Jess' birth. She lived with an aunt in a strange town and cried herself to sleep every night. After Jess was born, his mother fled the hospital within hours after refusing to see her baby Jess. Her shame and embarrassment were overwhelming her. Jess was placed, by pre-arrangement, in an adoptive home, but at age 4 both parents were killed in an auto accident. That is when Jess went through another adoption, and lived much like he had lived from age zero to age four.

     It is difficult to make a direct cause and effect connection between poor bonding and deviancy, mental disturbance, or suicide, but specialists like Mary Giffin, M.D. (1983) have traced enough stories and research to make the affirmation that poor bonding can be “disastrous.” Be careful to understand that not all suicidal feelings are traceable to adoption or poor bonding. Suicidal feelings come from feelings of failure, many disappointments or feelings of anger, or feelings of guilt, or other, at any age. Many people occasionally have feelings that life isn't worth living, and yet they do not commit suicide. Hurting and healing is part of living and being a person in this world.
     Essentially, bonding between parents and children is a continual process that never stops. Bonding needs time, energy, attention, praise, touch, hugs and communication. It is not impossible to form a deep and lasting intimacy with a child who did not bond readily or easily at first. Incubator babies and babies who need surgical processes at very early ages may lose some bonding intimacy for a time, but an un-bonded relationship is not hopeless. It will require more patience, more time and more involvement. If a parent tries to use force rather than love at this time, the child will not bond. Negative emotions and a show-of-force has almost no chance of producing emotionally healthy bonding.


                   “Tactile (touch) deprivation in infancy usually results in
                    behavioral inadequacies in later life.”
                                         Ashley Montague, 1986

 Touching for intimacy (Ashley Montague)

Ashley Montague, in Life Before Birth (1961, 1965) has documented the need for early emotional nurturing. He maintains that the chemistry of emotions can be communicated to an unborn child through the placenta. Emotions generate chemical messages, called hormones and catecholamines. Hormones and catecholamines, like vitamins, minerals and fluids pass from mother to child. A sudden surge of fear or anxiety sends the same chemical messengers through the baby. If the feelings of the mother are more love-filled than anger-filled, the newborn child will have experienced those emotions more. The calming effect of love will have helped the unborn child be more relaxed at birth and for some time thereafter. “Children who have been inadequately held and fondled will suffer, as adolescents and adults, from affect-hunger for such attention (Montague, 1986, p. 207).” “Affect hunger” is intimacy hunger. Certain persons have been emotionally starved. No wonder they hurt and manipulate their victims. They are starved for some Positive Strokes and Warm Fuzzies from other humans, and turn bitter when they can't find them in intimate relationships.

Never-ending need for touch


In Ashley Montague's book, Touch: The Human Significance of Skin (1986) he calls to our attention that much intimacy is generated through “touch.” Touch is called “tactile stimulation.” Nursing an infant is tactile stimulation. Cuddling, rocking, embracing, caressing, cooing, bathing, and playing are tactile stimulating activities that act as nourishment for the newly developing ego of the child. They are part of the bonding process which stabilizes the infant's emotions. “The messages (the child) receives through (the skin) must be security-giving, assuring, and pleasurable if the infant is to thrive (p. 217).”

     Montague suggests adult sexual intimacy is connected with earlier mother-bonding, touch and intimacy. Montague recalls Harry  Harlow's experiments with monkeys. Harry Harlow had given one baby monkey a stuffed/padded image to cling to instead of its mother. He deprived the other monkey of anything like a mother. Harlow allowed a third monkey to have it's mothers. The deprived monkey developed fears and non-trusting behaviors. Montague concludes that the motherless monkeys (those mother-monkeys who had their mothers removed at infancy) never learned how to be sexual like the mothered monkeys. He cites Anna Freud's comments that “being stroked, cuddled, and soothed by touch libidinizes (that's Positive Strokes; Ed.) the various parts of the child's body, helps to build up a healthy body image and body ego, increases its cathexis with narcissistic libido, and simultaneously promotes the development of object love by cementing the bond between child and mother.” “Adequate mothering is necessary for the development of healthy sexual behavior (Montague, 1986, p. 206).” Fathers are included: “If in our culture we could learn to understand the importance of fathers as well as mothers giving their infants adequate tactile satisfactions, we would be taking a considerable step toward the improvement of human relations (Montague, 1986, p. 373).” Early intimacy of a non-sexual nature helps the child develop better sexuality later.
     There are normal and appropriate limits and boundaries to touching. Any adult touching of children that is sexual in nature, or has sexual ideas or tendencies is strictly forbidden and punishable through our legal system. Report these “touch” behaviors to Community Mental agencies or Protective Service agencies.

 Shyness as poor development making friends

     In the 1970's and 1980's Philip G. Zimbardo made a well-documented and practical contribution to the understanding of shyness. Out of the Stanford Shyness Survey came information that about 80 of people throughout the world are shy at some time in their lives. About 40 percent consider themselves shy even at present. Only 7 percent of persons never have felt shy. Zimbardo believes that shyness is mostly learned. People lack social skills of conversation and thus develop unrealistic fears about communication. Sometimes a person has had a painful past experience that gets triggered. When anxiety arises the tape player in the brain replays the past painful experience, and the pain blocks a person from saying or doing what they really want. Zimbardo also pointed out that parents high expectations of children can bring on some shyness. It is interesting to see Zimbardo finding that the same experiences that cause shyness are the same experiences that make people withdraw and become isolated from others. Zimbardo's first steps in overcoming shyness are; learn to like yourself; build up your self-esteem; recognize your strengths; and develop social skills. Zimbardo suggests that a shy person learn how to relax, ask questions to initiate conversation and share a bit more than sports scores. Zimbardo suggests that a shy person not allow himself or herself to dwell on negative thoughts of self. There is one helpful guideline in Zimbardo's program that stands out, because it is so similar to regaining intimacy, close friendships and meaningful personal relationships. Zimbardo says, “Share your shyness.”
“Many people regard their shyness as something to be ashamed of and work hard to hide it. But shyness, like any other problem, needs to be talked about. Often the very act of telling another person how you feel lightens your burden. (Zimbardo & Radl, 1977, p. 146)

     If about half of the population of the world feels shy and embarrassed at times, Zimbardo says we ought to be comforted in that, and just own it, or say how we feel about being shy, the next time we need to make a speech in front of others. Later in the chapter we will look at the concept of “self-disclosure” and see the helpfulness of sharing feelings, owning up to embarrassment and disclosing our shyness. Zimbardo outlines many skills for conquering shyness, including neatness of appearance, volunteering, writing self-disclosing letters to obnoxious persons, and the skills mentioned above. Zimbardo's students and clients have benefited from his approach. They attack shyness on every front and go after the fears that block final triumph. No three-session interview with a counselor will be enough.


When Phillip Zimbardo and others suggest that people  own or disclose their shyness feelings, what he  is suggesting is something like this.

The next time you want to say something, but you feel shy, just preface what you want to say with something like this.

“I am sort of shy and I have a lot of fear in speaking up. However, I want to say that. . . . .”

When you “own” or “confess” this at least half the people listening to you will be quite careful not to  offend you with some follow-up statement.

They will actually be proud of you for taking the step.  TRY IT the next time you are in this situation.

 Sex and/or intimacy

Women prefer sex with intimacy, not sex without intimacy. But if women would have to make a choice the majority prefer intimacy over sex. Ann Landers found this out from 100,000 responses to a question in her newspaper column; “Would you be content to be held close and treated tenderly and forget about the act (of sex)?” Seventy percent of the women said, “Yes.” (Courtesy of Montague). While we may not have similar research on men, it appears that women have as much difficulty having sex without intimacy as men have difficulty producing intimacy without sex.
     The difference between the male's lesser interest in intimacy and the female's greater interest in intimacy is mainly attributed to the male visual-orientation. Intimacy is the key to the female sexual arousal system. For males the key factors are more biological. Male sexual interests prompt his romantic interests and activate his attention, his praise, his passion, and his concern for her happiness. Sexual arousal brings out his best plans for their intimacy. Then, in marriage, within a short time his pent-up sexuality is being fulfilled, and that reduces the forces that made him romantic before. Men should not forget the woman's need for closeness, friendship and intimacy as part of her sexuality. When men forget to be cultivate intimacy, the female is left with less intimacy and that generally depreciates into his having less frisky sex. The male needs to understand that intimacy, not pornography, is the route to healthy sex, both hers and his.

Developing Closeness

Feelings of closeness, friendship and intimacy vary a lot with people. If someone grows up with closeness that person will likely desire it and look for it. Unfortunately, certain persons find a substitute for intimacy and become addicted to it before that person learns about deeper intimacy needs. In their state of emotional distance or isolation they connect with a thrill, and mistakenly believe that is more important. A thrill is not usually considered a problem, except when a large number of thrills become a substitute for intimacy.

Session 7-2   FORCES UNDERMINING FRIENDSHIP
     AND CLOSER PERSONAL RELATIONS

Normally, a person is born with the capacity to reach out emotionally and connect with other emotionally nourishing experiences (Figure 7-1). Certain experiences make the emotional outreach fearful and withdrawing.

     Shyness is a complex result of past painful experiences and/or deficiencies in nourishment to the ego. It is a mild problem for some but crippling for others. Shyness is “an unfinished self-identity that is afraid of intimacy. Shyness inhibits intimacy by preventing self-disclosure and self-presentation due to fear and anxiety over other's evaluation or critique (Weaver, 1987).” Shyness is often traceable to early childhood traumatic experiences, which have made a person quite sensitive. Also, shyness has been traceable to an extremely hostile childhood environment. High competition from early age has resulted in shyness to some children who felt unable to win adequately in the competitive situation. Philip Zimbardo (1977) sees evidence for shyness existing in the heredity of families, even so-called good families. Shy persons are good people. Shy persons do not want to be hurt and they seldom hurt others. With some newly learned skills, shyness diminishes and confidence increases.

 Isolationist parents inhibiting intimacy

We are what we learn and what we create out of ourselves. Children have parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and that goes back generations. A person's intimacy range and intensity is subject to the influences of previous generations. Therefore, we need to be broad-minded and be sympathetic to issues faced by previous generations. In previous paragraphs we have seen some of the research that identifies certain problems occurring when “bonding” is insufficiently nurtured. “Lack of intimacy in parental relations” was characteristic (one of three mentioned) of parents of “122 pairs of twins, all of whom lived together until one or both developed schizophrenia (Moskalenko, 1984).” The research by R.D. Laing and A. Esterson (1964) at the Tavistock Institute in London, demonstrates as well, the destructive forces of intimacy-deficient parents. They cite 11 case histories of adolescent mental disturbances which they attribute to faulty parental emotional systems. It is likely that the faulty emotional systems of the parents, likewise, comes out of their experiencing faulty bonding and intimacy in their infancy and childhood.

Parental modeling impeding friendship / intimacy dynamics


Parental styles of relating influence childrens’ styles of relating. Four hundred psychiatrists were asked to respond to a questionnaire on the effects of unhappy marriages on children (Pietropinto, 1985). From this came a strong report on the connection between children's problems and parent's problems. Children sense emotional distance or lack of intimacy, even before couples realize their conflicts are becoming a problem. Younger children tend to withdraw and keep away from being hurt when their parents are fighting. They become isolation-oriented rather than intimacy-oriented. Older children sometimes become hostile, defiant and indulge in various substance abuses to keep themselves feeling acceptable. Conflicts due to neglect by one parent and overindulgence by the other parent cause children to become confused. Children withdraw in times of confusion. Children's emotions become undernourished within a conflict atmosphere. They pick up negative emotions. Their own psyche takes on the negative atmosphere of the home. Thus, the children turn negative, become hostile and possibly delinquent, due to their own inner love-hunger pain.

Inferior ego ideals marring intimacy


A person's friends can mar one's ability for psychological intimacy. The examples people see and the friends they make in their respective communities contribute to some intimacy needs. Non-intimate friends can be unhelpful in establishing healthy intimacy. Sometimes the choices are limited to groups and/or gangs. Gangs provide some of the friendship / intimacy which the human emotional system requires. Without this intimacy, people, especially adolescents and unmarried persons, become withdrawn. Certain persons experience bondage, or feel trapped. Even though they experience limited intimacy from acquaintances, and don't like the group's behaviors and values, yet they remain there; stuck by their own lack of imagination, lack of courage and lack of belief in another way of life. These cultural forces have the power to reduce a person's sense of self-esteem as well as their intimacy. Some who experience low intimacy turn hostile and mean. Others turn inward, withdraw and abuse substances which are self-destructive in the long run. (Figure 7-2)

 Abuse undermining intimacy


Physical, psychological and/or sexual abusiveness by a parent, friend or stranger, has the power of upsetting the victim's emotional system for a long time; that is, unless the person reveals, exposes, discloses and otherwise rejects the abuser and his or her lifestyle. Child abusers go to jail. To silence their victims, they threaten death, or indicate someone will die if they tell. They “sweet talk” with distortions and rationalization; using neurotic defenses to expand the boundaries of their own narcissistic impulses. Abusers cross over the boundaries of decency. By doing this the abuser can reduce a person's capacity for intimacy (Wyatt, Notgrass & Newcomb, 1990). (Figure 7-3)

Negative beliefs foiling intimacy  


If you believe in being friendly you will learn how to generate it. If a person does not believe in closeness and intimacy, that person will probably not enjoy the satisfaction of close friendships or intimacy. Researchers (Sillars & Scott; 1983) at Ohio State University reviewed the literature on intimacy. They suggest that irrational ”ideological beliefs about intimacy” can generate a “perceptual bias” causing conflict. In other words, if one married partner believes that intimacy is more important than the other married partner, such difference of belief can create conflict. Beliefs are quite naturally ideas which the mind processes and decides the worth of keeping and storing them in memory. Beliefs are connected to what we sense to be true from our own experience. Thus, if I never experienced sufficient bonding and intimacy, I may not believe in it; unless perhaps, I experienced a severe lack of it, became aggravated enough to discover the problem and learned how to fix low intimacy.

 Narcissism damaging intimacy

Recall that narcissism is the excessive preoccupation with one’s own personal impulses, passions and ideas. You see it taking place when someone is bragging too much, eating too much, drinking too much, talking too much, etc. All this, without sufficient self-control is hazardous to one’s health and well-being. A normal amount of narcissism is fundamental to survival of the self. Narcissism is just a bit of self-centeredness that, for example, prevents one from saving a drowning victim when one cannot swim well. If a person suffers psychologically from someone else's behavior or indulgent behavior, narcissism decides to protect self against another painful experience. In doing this narcissism curls back on the self or withdraws. In that ego state the narcissistic personality cannot give or receive intimacy. Hurt psyches frequently don't become intimate. Research (Carroll, 1987) has validated the negative relationship between narcissism and intimacy. (Figure 7-5)

Overview of research

The following diagram becomes an outline for the voluminous research which documents friendship and intimacy problems. (Figure 7-6). There is an inter-mixture of factors that have contributed to our ability or lack of ability to have strong friendships. As you look at the diagram, try to evaluate yourself. Past positive and negative experiences combine to affect us. They combine with certain genetic factors. They produce what you are at the present time.
     Now examine what you may need to do differently. Are you being swept up in the left stream? Are you being enticed get into the stream of life where you get most of your pleasure out of all the things to which you can become addicted?  Do you have enough of the characteristics of the stream on the right to enable you to become the most fulfilled person with the most meaningful friends?




     The desire for normal amounts of pleasure and happiness are instinctual. The Transactional Analysis model (Claude Steiner) popularized this concept with the idea of The Little Professor, who, figuratively speaking, resides in the innermost psychic system of people. It is his job to find a person's special forms of enjoyment. The enjoyments do not need to be abundant, but when intimacy is lacking, The Little Professor accomplishes his task the most quickly and easily by finding strong and quick-acting surges of pleasure, like in alcohol, drugs and deviant sex. Wise persons see addictive substances as traps, and diversions which never bring the kind of friendship and intimacy which the soul (psyche) of a person desires.

 Love deprivation affecting intimacy

People everywhere experience some love deprivation, that is, lack of Positive Strokes and Warm Fuzzies. (Figure 7-8) The problem of lack of love is central to mental and physical health. Research is abundant on this subject. At the Boise State University of Idaho, researchers (Walsh, Beyer & Petee, 1987) studied 256 male juvenile delinquents. The factors they chose were intellectual functioning (high to low), and love deprivation (high to low) in relation to the violence. “Love deprivation was more strongly related to violence . . . and severely love-deprived, low intelligence functioning psychopaths were the most violent (Abstract).” Love-deprivation is love hunger. Love hunger stunts the growth of intimacy. Love hunger occurs when a person lives with another who is psychologically unavailable.


  James was born of a professional father. His mother did not go to high school, but she knew how to be caring. They lived in a small river-bottom town where James' father practiced professionally. The great “Depression” of the 1930's was squeezing the life out of farming people. At age 5 James left with his father mother and baby sister to take up the same professional practice in another river-bottom town a couple hundred miles away. James left all the friends he had made for 5 years. The economy was harsh and James' father could not make his profession work there. The family moved to a university town so James' father could attend the university in order to change professions. James had no friends in his new town and school. James remembers crying behind the bushes at the university on the way to school, and pinching a toddler on the front steps of a neighbor's home. James was reacting to his parents psychological unavailability. After another move, from age 6-13 life improved some, and James felt accepted by friends. Everyone liked James. They took him fishing and hunting. They gave him jobs. He had money. Yet his father and he did nothing together. Never once did James' father ask James to go hunting, fishing, nothing. At age 13 James' father joined the army and became a captain very quickly. James moved with his father from town to town near the army camps. James was in 7 schools in 3 years. He had few real friends; mostly his friends were the shy and withdrawn boys like himself. When the war was over James' father told war stories and childhood stories. He told them hundreds of times. James said nothing for years. He was furious inside, but remained calm. Those same war stories and childhood stories got repeated until James spoke up at age 55 to his 85 year old father. Father quit telling stories, almost. The emptiness James felt for those years was partly compensated for by his good mother who said little about herself. Mother always asked questions. Father just told about himself. Mother was altruistic. Father was narcissistic. James was a very upset person most of his life. James functioned around it. He appeared to everyone to have his act together. However, inside he never felt intimate with his father, and it affected many relationships all his life.

     James' father was psychologically unavailable. His father was also narcissistically self-preoccupied. James' grandmother had died when James was 9. Thus, James' father learned to be narcissistic from his father, but also James' father was psychologically love-deprived by the loss of his mother. James was the victim of two generations of narcissism. The self-preoccupation of James' father never turned James into becoming withdrawn or isolated. James had his mother and maternal grandmother for his ego-ideal. It saved him from much misery. James also had a mind and a will that were governed by a belief system which would not let him turn hostile and deviant

Session 7-3  GAINS BY BEING FRIENDLY AND SOCIAL

You lower your risk having a number of problems when you increase your levels of friendly and social interaction. We have known this since the creation of the Minnesota Multiphase Personality Inventory (MMPI) between the late 1930's and early 1950's. Researchers assembled 504 questions (later to 550 questions) around 9 mental illness problems (also increased to 10 items. They were looking for a way to determine the severity of the problems, and how to distinguish one illness from the other.. The University of Minnesota undertook the research. They wanted to make a differential diagnosis between the following problems; hypochondriasis, depression, conversion hysteria, psychopathic deviancy, masculine-feminine identity, paranoia, psychesthenia, schizophrenia, and hypomania (later social was added). “Social” was added last.

Friendliness has strong benefits


When using this test “social” becomes a major factor in interpreting the final differentiations of the degree of severity of any one of several of these factors in mental dysfuntioning. “Social” controls the severity. High “social” means the person is suffering less severely than the raw scores are indicating.  And low “social” suggest that the person is suffering at a rate that is higher than the raw scores indicate. “Social” becomes a moderating influence in the whole realm of mental illness problems. “Social” reduces the risk/severity of the person. A person with higher “social” scores is better off, mentally speaking, than persons with low “social” scores. (Figure 7-6)
     This research has been corroborated many times. One of the most significant supportive research projects suggests that the “social” person has many more benefits. Highly social and friendly persons have  less risk of illness. They average about one-third the number of illnesses in a lifetime. Social persons average about one-fourth the symptoms of alcoholism. Social persons average about one-third fewer smoking symptoms (Franken, 1995).
          “People don’t buy from people they don’t like.” is a saying that has a great deal of merit. When you are employed, people you work with will be less inclined to accept suggestions from you, unless you have demonstrated friendliness. That won’t be true for every one in every situation. However, the chart on the right gives one some clues about the importance of learning the skills for friendship and social interaction.

Stress reduction with friendliness and sociability


Research finds a close association between higher levels of friendship / sociability and stress reduction. You need to believe this for the sake of your health and well-being. Beliefs guide our behavior. You learned this in Chapter 4. In Chapter 4 you were taught a strong problem-solving skill called Cognitive Restructuring. You learned names of the pioneers in this skill; Albert Ellis, Aaron Beck, M.D., Martin Seligman, Ph.D., Maxie Maultsby. This is a reminder that a belief in friendliness and sociability is a rational belief with positive consequences.
     This course is as much about convincing you to practice optimum friendliness as well learning about it to pass a test. One day, you will be extremely depressed. You may experience a sequence of failed efforts, and you begin to sit home and mope, drink and withdraw. You may experience the lost of someone very dear to you. This may be depressing and your natural response is to withdraw. Don’t withdraw. Socialize!  You may experience a series of put-downs from the mouths of persons who are meaningful to you, and you want to withdraw. Be careful. Your psyche (soul) needs the nourishment of friendship. If you scuttle the message of this page, and retreat into more solitude than is appropriate, you can set yourself up for illness. (Figure 7-7)


D. SELF-DISCLOSURE SKILLS FOR SOCIAL RELATIONS

The skill and/or art of self-disclosure (Sidney Jourard)

Sidney Jourard did not invent self-disclosure for improving friendship and intimate relations, but he certainly gets credit for energizing the concept. This section will describe Sidney Jourard's concept of  self-disclosure, found in his book The Transparent Self (Van Nostrand, 1971). The student must be careful to see the concept of self-disclosure as a multi-faceted skill that combines with other skills for the maintenance of intimacy. Remember Chapter 1 love and Positive Strokes. To reach higher levels of friendship and intimacy you may need some of this to get started. Remember Chapter 4 on Cognitive Restructuring. You'll also need some of that for increased intimacy. Remember Chapter 5 on increasing trust! You will need a little of that too for increasing intimacy.. Then blend these skills with the psychological concept of self-disclosure so significantly expounded by Sidney Jourard, former Professor of Psychology at the University of Miami.


     In this almost poetic expression, Jourard suggests that self-disclosure opens up one's psyche to be fed by the Warm Fuzzies and Positive Strokes of a relationship. People can get sick and become mentally disturbed from lack of Strokes and Fuzzies (originally it was called libidinal nourishment), so self-disclosure is a way to get one's psyche (soul) filled with positive experiences without going to self-destructive substances and behaviors. Self-disclosure becomes a way to build strength into the core of a person. (Figure 7-8)


Self-disclosure and the pursuit of truth (Jourard)

Suppose you feel alone, even friendless and depressed. Suppose you keep that a secret, while putting on a fake smile. That's a lie. Jourard indicates that people get sick for not being honest.
  “We are said to be a society dedicated to the pursuit of truth. Yet, disclosure of the truth, the truth of one's being, is often penalized. . . When a (person) has been unable to acknowledge to himself who, what and how he is, he is out touch with reality, and he will sicken. (p. 6).”

     Jourard is suggesting that the truth about what we feel happening inside us should be “disclosed.” If the mean bully kicks another school child in the shins, the truth is that it hurts, and the hurt person should disclose that truth. The hurt school child should say, “Hey, stop it. That hurts.“ Not disclosing generates inner tensions that can end up as sickness over a period of time. Such disclosure of truth about one's inner pain makes it public knowledge. Enough of this public knowledge could influence the mean bully's behavior over time to stop the bullying.

                “Being heard and touched by another who cares,
                 seems to reinforce identity, mobilize spirit, and promote
                 self-healing.”  Sidney Jourard, The Transparent Self, 1971

     Why does a person feel so fearful about revealing the truth of inner feelings? When scientists discover a new truth, they can't wait to make it known. It appears that people fear retaliation, and fear larger hurts and embarrassment. Fear inhibits the disclosure of truth. Yet truth is larger than fear. People need to believe that truth ultimately wins.

Self-disclosure and sharing feelings (Jourard)

Self-disclosure reveals feelings. Sidney Jourard does not suggest that self-disclosure means a person should uncork every thought or every experience and pour it out to every person s/he meets. “The Fear That Cheats Us of Love,” wrote Jourard (1971), is the fear of self-disclosure. This does not mean that people become babbling brooks which deliver an incessant running dialogue. Nor does it mean that people have a right to self-disclose by exploding with hostility, and spraying it on others. As always there is a happy middle-ground, which allows for more or less disclosure, using appropriate intensities, at appropriate times. The optimum set of lifestyles includes an unceasing effort to push to the side of intimacy through self-disclosure.
     Men are known for their inability and/or unwillingness to share personal feelings adequately. They stick to topics; politics, sports, economy, technological developments, etc., in a sometimes-game of one-ups-man-ship. Men are more inclined to put a lid on their feelings. Men appear to be less inclined to share feelings of inadequacy, or feelings of anxiety, fear or shame. Men in general, have less willingness to see the need for feelings that produce gratitude and praise.

     Women disclose more feelings. Women disclose their delight with child development. Women disclose their amazement and give praise. Women disclose their disappointments and fears, both the relational and the personal. Psychology has debated whether this is due more to heredity or to cultural messages that inhibit men’s sharing of feelings. We do not need to debate that here. Sidney Jourard (1971, p. 85) believes that a women's disclosure capabilities may be contributing to her greater degree of intimacy, which in turn, increases health and longevity.

Self-disclosure and health (Jourard)

Jourard is suggesting what others have proven to be true. When the lid is too tight over the unconscious and feelings are kept locked up, people get sick. Psychology in general is a pursuit of truth, truth about what makes problems develop and what prevents or solves problems. The truth is that hiding one's feelings doesn't work too well.

“Self-disclosure is a symptom of personality health and a means of ultimately achieving healthy personality (p. 32) . . . Every maladjusted person is a person who has not made himself known to another human being and in consequence does not know himself. Nor can he know himself. More than that, he struggles actively to avoid becoming known by another human being. He works at it ceaselessly, twenty-four hours daily, and it is work. In the effort to avoid becoming known, a person provides for himself a cancerous kind of stress which is subtle and unrecognized, but none the less effective in producing not only the assorted patterns of unhealthy personality which psychiatry talks about, but also the wide array of physical ills that have come to be recognized as the province of psychosomatic medicine (pp. 32-33).”

     It is frightfully difficult for persons to believe that self-disclosure can be helpful. It appears that people have a strong pull towards isolationist behavior, perhaps because people lack the skills to form deep, close and intimate relations. Without problem-solving skills, without social skills, and without models of healthy behavior, a person will probably remain fearful which contributes to poorer health. If a person can learn a few basic skills, like those found in this textbook, the person can break out of isolationist tendencies. Once a person learns skills, that person can believe in breaking out of shyness, loneliness and isolation.

    

Self-disclosure is important to the prevention and treatment of many emotional disturbances like depression. Depressed persons disclose fewer intimacy-oriented feelings (Gibbons, 1987). Depressed persons keep a tight lid on the cauldron of negativity in the unconscious. If the lid between the unconscious and conscious is shut too tightly, persons will have difficulty with self-disclosure. Treatment for depression improves intimacy (Waring, Chamberlaine, McCrank & Stalker, et al., 1988) A more basic approach to self-disclosure is to settle past hostilities so the conscious can handle cleaner unconscious feelings. Persons who have been abused need to confront the abuser, either face to face, or in a letter. Persons who tend to defer to others and give in a lot, need to learn to speak up for their rights and needs. If done without attacking and shouting, it will tend to produce some remorse and then the abused person can forgive. That process helps to open the lid between the unconscious and conscious, making self-disclosure easier, and deeper intimacy possible.

Mutual self-disclosure for closer personal relations

A person does not just start self-disclosing and expect to have a greater amount of intimacy. Self-disclosure is appropriate when someone is harmed, hurt, or embarrassed by another person, but also when a person wishes to express some feelings that will enhance the closeness or intimacy of their relationship. Jourard believes that some degree of mutuality or reciprocity (give and take) is basic to this more positive kind of self-disclosure.

“We learned something in our researches about the conditions under which people are willing to make dimensions of themselves known to others. One of these conditions was mutual disclosure (p. 17).”

     Since Jourard, research has been trying to refine what behaviors or attitudes promote self-disclosure. Some factors dictate when self-disclosure is appropriate, and what kind of self-disclosure is appropriate. Steven Broder (1987), Boston University, evaluated 4 major aspects of the concept of self-disclosure: “reciprocity, liking, trust and appropriateness.” Annie Devault (1988), University of Quebec, Montreal, Canada, reviewed the literature on intimate relationships, as well as factors influencing self-disclosure. She concludes there are 5 basic factors: (1) “social reinforcement,” meaning there are appropriate places and times where people approve of self-disclosure, (2) “reciprocity,” meaning that good self-disclosure occurs when both people exchange disclosures, (3) “length of relationship,” meaning that people disclose more when they know someone for a longer period, (4) “sexual differences,” meaning that one gender discloses more than another, (5) “degree of marital satisfaction,” meaning that the amount of disclosure is related to how much a married couple feel happy with each other.


To be happier and live longer, share more of your feelings.

The good ones are compliments.

The bad ones are confessions.




Self-disclosure resolving interpersonal conflict
In marriage counseling, therapists encounter the intimacy problem. Generally, the female wants more intimacy and the male is often content as long as there is sexual intimacy (Hatch & Leighton, 1986). Kerrie James (1989, Australia) sees this as a “distancer-pursuer” pattern. The desire for intimacy by one partner, sets up a pursuit. The lonely partner chases the aloof or distancer partner. The chaser often feels cheated out of intimacy, believes s/he must be doing something wrong and pursues even harder out of a sense of false guilt. The distancer may feel smothered and overwhelmed. These feelings make the distancer become more distant. The problem is knowing if the distancer is too distant or the pursuer is too dependent. Generally it is a cyclical problem in which both contribute percentages. One day the pursuer needs more Positive Strokes and Warm Fuzzies, but the distancer is very busy and can't supply enough. That can polarize the couple, like two magnets, pushing north pole to north pole, which drives them further apart. Tomorrow the distancer is ready or freer to supply Positive Strokes and Warm Fuzzies, but now the pursuer is hurt from yesterday and isn't willing to be friendly. Emotional isolation and emotional intimacy will often fluctuate between too little and too much. If two people can just self-disclose their feelings about their problems, much conflict can be resolved.


Self-disclosure preparing for creativity

The same open access to emotions, needed by marriage partners, is the same open access to emotions needed by creative persons in the arts, sciences, business and industry; almost everywhere. The executive president of a large corporation needs to have access to his/her emotions in order to fire off memos and make momentous decisions in rapid order. The emotions are at the core of all human processes. The emotions are part of the deeper integrative machinery of the ego. The emotions are speedy chips of the human psychic computer. The artist and the inventor need to be free to enter into their emotions. If the emotions are blocked (by ignorance of skills), or covered up in the unconscious by past hates, and current obsessions, or possibly other things not yet known, the person is going to be somewhat limited in function, either in marriage, in business or in creative pursuits.

Exercises in developing self-disclosure

Self-disclosure is more of an art than a definitive set of behaviors that make up a skill. Therefore, learning to self-disclose when you are hurt or happy can hardly be set in outline form.
     The following are sentence stimulators that can bring forth memories of past feelings. They can act to grease up the passageway between your feelings and your mouth. Recall when you experienced these feelings in the past.


ASPECTS OF INTIMACY

1. Feeling
2. Closeness
3. Developed relationship
4. Purposely selected
5. Mutuality of feeling
6. Mutual commitment
7. Mutually adult experience

     John Thomas Trimble
     Intimacy in Marriage, 1978

      1. My most joyous moment was when........
      2. I was terribly frightened one time when......
      3. My most embarrassing moment occurred........
      4. One of the naughty things my friend and I did....
      5. I sometimes have a fantasy that I......
      6. Was my Dad ever mad when I......
      7. Was my Mother ever mad when I.....
      8. I felt I wasn't treated fairly.....
      9. If I had my way I would........
     10. I really hate......
     11. I dislike it when my mother....
     12. I dislike it when my father....     
     13. When I get really angry....
     14. Let me tell you about the last sunset I saw.....
     15. This is how I feel when I am treated properly...

     Some of these sentence completions will be easier; some more difficult. People don't mind sharing these things when they participate in a growth-group process or group therapy, but it is harder for persons to share deeper experiences to strangers, nor is it necessarily appropriate. People are not always compassionate and caring, so we fear someone will take our private experience and tease us about it in public. The above sentences would be easier to complete by lovers and lovers who are friends.

Role of beliefs in self-disclosure (Jourard)

Sidney Jourard helps us understand that beliefs affect people and their ability to have closeness (intimacy) in their relationships. If a person's cultural (family) belief system has been guided by non-disclosure and the resulting non-intimacy, the person needs to change the belief system. Psychological research in the early part of this chapter challenges the non-intimate and non-disclosing dysfunctional intimacy value systems. This research says that excessively object-oriented persons are less healthy than persons with larger interpersonal intimacy. A person should love his wife more than his new car. He should spend as much money on making her happy as making himself happy with his expensive car. (Maybe that is too feminist!, but you get the point, right?) To accomplish this a person needs to make a change in what s/he values. That may be difficult for some people who have not grown up with closeness at home.
     The more optimum lifestyles need to include a belief in, and include an emphasis on intimacy-oriented behavior rather than on object-oriented behavior. Closeness in a relationship is far healthier than closeness to an object (house, car, hobby, addictive substance, etc.). Each person finally works out a formula that includes some of both; some interest in objects and some interest in people. That is normal. There is no fixed formula. There is only research data to suggest that people need to find a respectable middle-ground, slightly tilted toward the love of people and social relations.


Sharing positive feelings



Regaining one's understanding (one's belief) of what is healthy self-disclosure isn't easy. Some highly verbal and highly narcissistic persons may never learn to stop talking arrogantly about their achievements. Some shy persons may never catch the vision of resolving the problem of emotional distance. A few may possibly hit the bottom of despair over their emotional distance, like an alcoholic, before the light of close relationships dawns. Self-disclosure is not an unloading of negativity. Self-disclosure is talking about your feelings when you are hurt, but also sharing your feelings when you are pleased (complimenting); not too little, not too much. Let's look at a person we call James. Let us see what made him become more self-disclosing and more able to generate close relationships. (Figure 7-11)

      James, whose relationship with his father was described earlier in this chapter, became more psychologically available than his father. It happened in college. James was reading for a literature course in college, when one of the characters in a story spoke to his inner being. The character sensed his own narcissism, his psychic fixation on his past hurts and low self-esteem. James sensed from what he was reading that he, like the character in the story, had become self-centered. The character in the story changed to become more focused on others. James determined then, that he would talk less about himself and work at focusing on learning about others. James turned it around, narcissism to altruism. It became a life-long labor of love, one that James never fully succeeded at, but he made a lot of progress. James learned to love others, and bent his psyche outward from its previous inward position. In addition he increased reciprocity of communication by remembering important things about people and commenting or asking those persons later.

     People are less able to self-disclose in the way that Sidney Jourard suggested, without love, sensitivity, decency and expressions which empower positive behavior. Self-disclosure can increase with increased altruism. Self-disclosure is often a confession, “owning up” to the real truth inside. As a confession it generates remorse and penitence in the person that caused the offense. Self-disclosure functions to produce closeness, warmth and friendship. If self-disclosure does not have love, warmth, friendship and intimacy as it's goal, then it is not the self-disclosure that Sidney Jourard is talking about.

Self-disclosure as communication (Jourard)

Sidney Jourard's book is entitled The Transparent Self, and that becomes the message of self-disclosure. When a person communicates to another person about something that is not visible, it makes the person transparent. If I tell you that I am filled with zeal, impassioned about writing this book, but that I have occasional pains in my legs from sitting at my computer, then I have made myself somewhat transparent. You can see inside me. If I go on and tell you that I ache for every hurting young person who grew up without knowing intimacy skills, because I never experienced much intimacy, closeness or friendship with my father, then I have become transparent for a brief moment. Now, you can see me having emotional pain. I've turned my hurt into your benefit, I hope. I am communicating that to you. It is my self-disclosure. You can now respond with some feeling, or with no feeling, depending on your own openness or fear of closeness feelings (intimacy).
     Every person should decide to be a communicator, for that contributes to increased self-disclosure and intimacy. The person who retreats psychologically into an isolationist frame of mind, is taking the easy, least resistant, the uninformed pathway to larger and possibly problematic discontent.
      If you do a lot of self-disclosing, but seldom ask people questions about their feelings or thoughts on certain subjects, then something is missing. Deep friends talk incessantly about everything. Their conversation is full of reciprocity, meaning their verbal exchanges go back and forth. Friends trust each other and their defenses don't block the passage of emotions from the unconscious to the conscious and then to verbal expression. Intimacy-oriented persons remember to ask about what others have been doing, and what others think and feel about a variety of events.

“What did you do yesterday?”
     “How's work?”
     “How's your mother?”
     “When are you going to....?”
     “Did you see in the paper that....?”
     “I see you are rather unhappy today!”

PERSONAL
APPLICATION

If you don't know what to SAY to someone, ASK the person something about himself or herself.






     Intimacy-oriented persons offer compliments, praise, congratulations, all of which requires sufficient caring and thoughtfulness to make the brain cells remember.

     “This is a good meal. Thank you.”
     “Hey, you were great in the play!”
     “That is a great looking car (dress, lawn)!”
     “That was a great idea!”
     “I'm proud of you!”
     “Daughter, I think you are a beautiful person.”
     “Son, once in while I'm upset, but I'm proud of you.”
     “You are a very thoughtful person.”

     Reciprocity of self-disclosure doesn't need to be a one-sentence question. Sometimes reciprocity requires some compassionate pursuing of the other person's living events, using some active listening, like the following.

     “So how did things go last night?”
          (Response)
     “And then where did you go?
          (Response)
     “Gee, that must have been fun!”
          (Response)
     “Oh! not so great? Tell me about it.
          (Response)
     “So, how do you feel about it today?”
          (Response)
     “That sounds like a lot of hassle?”
          (Response)
     “Is there anything I can help with?”
          (Response)
     “I would be glad to .......”
          (Response)
     This compassionate approach could continue for more sentences. It should be apparent that the dialogue shows a very un-narcissistic, caring, compassionate, sensitive and outgoing communication pattern. There is no sudden narcissistic self-centered story triggered by the “Response.” The questions above indicate a strong other-centeredness, necessary for reciprocity to take place and intimacy to be maintained or generated. This is self-disclosure of the highest quality. It is a disclosure of loving and caring without words. It is a self-disclosure with a large amount of Carl Rogers concept of “unconditional positive regard.” There are rare and beautiful persons who do this habitually. People like intimacy disclosures more than they like non-disclosures (McAllister & Bregman, 1983). Intimacy increases when self-disclosure is responded to by another person with equal sensitivity and ability for self-disclosure (Falk & Wagner, 1985). Intimacy doesn't increase unless both persons have an adequate amount of other-centered love and compassion.

E. SELF-DISCLOSURE IN ROMANCE & MARRIAGE

Physical, mental and emotional well-being depends on a person’s capacity for intimacy and their skills to achieve it, or deal without having it. In this chapter we reviewed some of the research, showing how people find counterfeit intimacies. We also reviewed how deviant sexual behaviors result from a combination of lack of love, anger/rage and deficiency of friendship skills or intimacy. Now, let us review what psychology is saying about intimacy and self-disclosure in finding, maintaining and keeping your mate as your best friend and sexual companion.


                           “While we may be mature in years, sexual maturity is a long,
                            complicated process not systematically linked to physiological
                            and chronological development. In fact, in modern societies, the
                            individual's sexual self is the least and last explicitly developed
                            dimension of self.”     Jean Lipman-Blumen, American Families,
                             E. Douvan, et al.,   (Eds.) 1980

 Attraction, self-disclosure and intimacy  

Attraction has a high priority in intimate relationships. People are attracted to each other for many qualities; their physical makeup, their value systems, their socio-economic levels, etc. In initial stages of dating, physical attraction is important, but “women's looks count more than men's.” Women look for many things in men, but often, men are “judged for their ability to generate income (Sternberg, 1987, p. 214).” In attraction the psyche, the central integrating equipment of a person, gathers information simply by looking at the person to whom s/he is attracted. In a flash of a second that psychic computer compares the person with the inner image of what one is looking for. Sometimes, the psyche takes more time in measuring attraction. It may take time to go through enough reciprocal self-disclosures to allow attraction to exist and/or grow.

---------------------------------


BEHAVIORS THAT COUNTERACT THE DECLINE OF INTIMACY

1. much more frequently talk over pleasant things that happen during the day.

2. feel more frequently understood by their spouses.

3. discuss things which are shared interests.

4. are less likely to break communication or inhibit it by pouting.

5. more often will talk with each other about personal problems.

6. generally talk most things over together.

7. are more sensitive to each other's feelings and make adjustments to take these into account when they speak.

8. are more free to discuss intimate issues without restraint or embarrassment.

9. are more able to tell what kind of day their spouses have had without asking.

10. communicate non-verbally to a greater degree, via the exchange of glances.

Donald P. Cushman, Dudley D. Cahn, Jr.
Communication in Interpersonal Relationships, 1985


 Dating, self-disclosure and intimacy

During the time that persons date each other, both are testing their compatibility factors. Deeper and more personal self-disclosure takes place during dates. Opposites do attract each other in adolescents, but opposites do not always make the most compatible marriage partners. Dating is a time of self-disclosure to explore compatibility. There needs to be quite a lot of agreement within certain areas. Some slight polarization of liberal and conservative thinking may be appropriate, but a strong liberal and a strong conservative may have difficulty, especially if there are too many polarities. Wide variance in religious belief and commitment may add stress to friendship or intimacy in a relationship. Introverts and extroverts who polarize too much may add another strain to their relationship. “Red necks” and “high-brows” may make their friendship and/or intimacy work, especially if other factors are not excessively different. In general, the more similarities between two persons the more enjoyable it is to self-disclose and produce intimacy.
     The theory of  complementarity (Winch, 1958: Sternberg, 1987), is the theory that each person has certain needs and dating is a time to look around to find who most closely meets those needs. Some persons have a need to follow, others to lead. Some persons have a need to nurture, others to be nurtured. Some persons have a need to find someone like their parent, or very much not like the parent they knew. In adolescence, dating is a time of exploring for compatibility. It takes time and can be very enjoyable, even though there are certain pains along the way.

 Passion, self-disclosure and intimacy

Passion, the pre-sexual part of dating may be friendly and/or intimate, but there is not a lot of self-disclosure going on during passion. Passion has less to contribute to compatibility than self-disclosure, though it revs up a lot of pleasure. Passion is mother nature's insurance against extinction of the human race. Attraction, combined with sexual passion, is not necessarily love. Instant attraction and “falling in love” is partly mythical, and slightly misleading. Attraction and passion are definitely high expectations for marriage. However, attraction and passion of the highest order are not in every dating game and marriage. Attraction/passion and marriage are not necessarily tied together. People can experience attraction and passion any time; before dating, while dating another, in marriage, out of marriage, in an affair, at work, socializing, with a neighbor, or a friend. Passion generally arises with physical attraction, sexual arousal and need for intimacy, but passion is not emotional intimacy. Powerful attraction brings two persons together quickly. However, powerful attraction/passion may only be superficial, and incompatibilities can soon put out the flames of passion. Some persons have too high an expectation for the amount of attraction/passion they feel is necessary for them to be in love. If such a person only waits for the exotic experience of super attraction/passion in dating, as a requirement for marriage, that person may wait a long time for the right marriage partner. This attraction/passion phenomenon diminishes somewhat after marriage (Sternberg, 1987, p. 223).

Eros, philos, agape promoting intimacy

Married friends need three kinds of love, three ingredients. The Greeks had three words for “love”; Eros was the Greek word for the erotic, the passionate form of love, as well as a love for things. Philos was the Greek word for the friendship element in love, which develops after many months. Agape is the Greek word for the altruistic—caring, sharing, giving—part of love, that gives more than it takes. When all three of these elements exist, one sees the optimum form of love. Problems begin to arise when persons try to latch on to the passionate part (eros) at the expense of the philos (longer friendship), or the agape (sacrificial generosity), or any other distortion. When men forget birthdays and don't want to give gifts, they show considerably less agape. When women become so involved with child-rearing (agape) they don't have time for fun outside the home with their husbands, or passion in the home, then agape-love is too dominant. Intimacy is enhanced by a proper proportion of each ingredient. The male, in particular, is heavily bombarded with cues that the eros element is the main part of love. The male would enjoy more recreational sex and sport sex, more of the erotic. The female needs intimacy and friendship for optimum sexual performance; more philos. That sometimes puts partners in conflict and is a source of some partner dissatisfaction.

Altruism generates close friendships.

Narcissism generates distance  and alienation.



Commitment versus cohabitation

While some persons are suggesting that the human need for intimacy requires “commitment” (Trimble, 1978), a few are still determined to live together ( co-habitation) without the marriage contract. Co-habitation tripled in the 1970's (Cushman & Cahn, 1985). Researchers (Ridley, Peterman & Avery, 1978) examined the various motivational factors of co-habitation without marriage and devised four different categories: (1) Linus Blanket co-habitation exists where an insecure person needs to bunk-in with a more secure person. (2) Emancipation live-in arrangements are short-term and provide transition to another arrangement. (3) Convenience, along with emancipation make up nearly 75% of co-habitation. Ridley, Peterman and Avery find emancipation and convenience co-habitations last less than 6 months. There is no commitment, and the temporary arrangements do not foster intimacy, so they break up quickly. (4) Testing is the motivation for some to take up co-habiting with their prospective partner. Researchers found these persons to be emotionally healthier and better-adjusted than other co-habitors. There was more reciprocity of communication and more sharing of emotional intimacy. However, research has shown that co-habitation before marriage does not insure that the marriage is better or more stable over time.

  Positive Stroking for intimacy  

Female nurturing appears natural, almost biologically determined. Males often appear to be less nurturing and need less of the nurture connected with intimacy needs. Nurturing may be inborn in males too. Male birds help in the building of nests and nurturing their young. Researchers (Sawin & Parke, 1979) observed fathers and mothers with their newborn infants; especially watching various nurturing behaviors like rocking, looking, fondling, smiling. They noted that when both parents were present, the fathers were more involved in these nurturing behaviors, than the mothers. When the fathers were by themselves with the newborn, they engaged in an equal number of these nurturing behaviors. Sawin and Parke offer this as evidence that the male is equally capable of being emotionally involved with others. If any particular male is less nurturing, then that male needs to learn what fear is inhibiting him and how he can overcome the narcissism that is blocking this normally good behavior.

  “Alignment of sexual and emotional
intimacy is central to the emergence
of a deep interpersonal relationship.”

Donald P. Cushman, Dudley D. Cahn, Jr.  1985
Communication in Interpersonal Relationships

     Male intimacy often appears to be stunted, blocked and distorted. Women agree that men are certainly not nurturing enough to meet enough of women's intimacy needs. Almost everyone agrees that men have the same capacity for nurture and intimacy. Yet, there are statistical differences between male and female, in how much intimacy they want or generate. The question of why men have less interest in intimacy has fostered considerable research. The sociologists see the male as fearful of vulnerability: his macho needs protection, so he remains quite non-disclosing. The ego psychologists describe this problem in terms of psychological narcissism which is excessive pre-occupation with self-indulgent behaviors. Doyle (1989) reviewed the literature on the male hormone, testosterone, and showed how genetically-triggered testosterone helps to create the male child. He cited research which is attempting to discover whether the male lack of nurturing and intimacy feelings are related to his testosterone levels. Some research exists on both sides, substantiating the idea and negating the idea. At this time the research is not strong enough to blame testosterone production for lack of intimacy-generating behaviors in males.

Attraction/Passion and human survival

 Some persons have a panic-style fear, when it comes to asking a girl for a date, or going out. Fear is a major obstacle to male-female enjoyment, as well as to more in-depth intimacy. If a person practices hiding all his or her thoughts and fears, and if a person can't laugh at his/her faults, then fear is too dominant. Here is how one person describes it,

         “Fear of vulnerability. Fear of our emotions. Fear of being
          uncovered, found out. So my fear leads to my desire to
          control my feelings.     No one will know my doubts.
          No one will really know that I am not the producer and
          achiever I seem to be. Therein lies my real terror.
               (Nelson, 1988, p. 50).

   “The only way to have a friend is to be one.”   Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803-1882


     A large amount of attraction and passion is needed to overcome men’s and women’s dating fears. Without that strong attraction/passion drive the human species might not survive (humorously speaking). Perhaps that is why attraction/passion is so powerful. But attraction and passion are not the prime requirements for most marriages in the world. Good people get together and get married and stay together without huge amounts of attraction and passion.
Pre-arranged marriages without attraction/passion

In large segments of the world pre-arranged marriages exist in entire cultures. The marriages develop deep friendship, strong emotional intimacy, good sex and remain permanent. Persons who marry without the overwhelming attraction/passion need to have a philosophy of life that others are first, and they are second. Altruistic love, with more other-centeredness, generates intimacy. There is a saying, “Perfect love casts out fear.” This altruistic (serving, caring) style may have enough love in it to transcend any fear of intimacy. If narcissism (I come first, last and always) dominates a person's lifestyles, then there may not be enough altruistic love to conquer the fear of intimacy. Without a commitment to altruistic agape (making your love be nurturing), marriages fail when attraction and passion diminish. Persons who want to self-indulge in the erotic, the sexual, without generating intimacy, may fear their narcissism will not get fed, so they avoid a permanent commitment. Agape loving breaks through narcissism into more permanent relationships.

Investment in a passionate marriage

         “What is a friend?  A single soul dwelling in two bodies.”  Aristotle, 384-322 BC

Intimacy, like a condo, has an initial cost and a regular maintenance fee. It costs people time, money and energy to achieve intimacy. People put fuel in their gas tanks, preventing themselves from stalling along the highway. Optimum lifestyle people keep a sufficient supply of intimacy fuel on hand. They do something about increasing the level before it runs out. They do not want to be stalled along the highway of life in a divorce court. People stock their kitchen shelves on a regular basis to prevent the supply of food from running out. Optimum lifestyle people keep the emotional supply of intimacy well-stocked. They put intimacy high on the list of important psychological food.
Your mate as your best friend.

     Having a best friend, whether the person is single, or your married partner, is healthy. Enjoyment, health and longevity have statistically higher advantages in marriage, especially for men. Unbeknown to people, some of their interests in sport sex (sex without much intimacy), isolationist drinking, counterfeit intimacies (pornographic stimulation), substitutes for intimacy, and deviancies are often self-destructive.

     The optimum set of psychological lifestyles includes a relationship built on emotional closeness (intimacy). This does not mean that one cannot be a good person without a friend or a mate. Good persons are capable of honorable deeds without the same amount of closeness another person has. In general, intimacy is natural. Intimacy is healthier, physically and mentally. Higher scores on intimacy measurements are less prevalent among jailed persons and persons using addictive substances.
     The skills advocated in this chapter center around Ashley Montague’s touching, and around Sidney Jourard’s self-disclosure. They tie in with the skills of sharing feelings, described in another chapter.


SUMMARY OF MAIN POINTS

READING:

GETTING FREE: You Can End Abuse and Take Back Your Life, by Ginny NiCarthy, Seal Press, 1988, 348 pages.

TALKING IT OUT: A Guide to Groups for Abused Women by Ginny NiCarthy, Seal Press, 1984, 175 pages.

HELP FOR THE BATTERED WOMAN by Lydia Savina, Bridge Publishing, 1987, 432 pages

OUTGROWING THE PAIN: A Book for and About Adults Abused as Children, by Eliana Gil, Ph.D., Dell Pub., 1983, 95 pages

THE COURAGE TO HEAL: A Guide for Women Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse, by Ellen Bass & Laura Davis, Harper and Row, 1988, 403 pages

VICTIMS NO LONGER: Men Recovering from Incest and Other Sexual Child Abuse, by Mike Lew, Harper and Row, 1988, 352 pages

THE SECRET TRAUMA: Incest in the Lives of Girls and Women, by Diana E. H. Russell, Basic Books, 1986, 446 pages

SCREAM LOUDER: Through Hell and Healing with an Incest Survivor and Her Therapist, by Marsha Utain & Barbara Oliver, Health Communications, 1989, 320 pages  

SUMMARY

1. Intimacy is what a person experiences in deeper friendships. Intimacy feeds the emotions with Positive Strokes.
2. Bonding is an emotional closeness that occurs between mother and baby at very early stages. Bonding is important to the emotional strength and stability of the child.
3. Ashley Montague has collected research showing the importance of touching, both in the bonding process, in health, in healing and in marriage.
4. Philip Zimbardo is known for his studies of shyness, which he describes as a fear of intimacy. Shyness isn't produced by heredity, natural disaster, or accidents as much as it is produced by negative environments.
5. More intimacy is required by women for their sexual arousal, than for men, and men need to generate close feelings in a variety of ways.
6. Lack of intimacy is basically a lack of the ability to share one's feelings with someone whom a person trusts. Harsh childhood treatment blocks the development of intimacy.
7. Researchers discovered that about one-third of the parents of schizophrenic twins (one or both) where characterized by lack of intimacy.
8. Internal fears, wrong ideas, irrational beliefs and poor reality-testing can also create a slow retreat into isolation.

9. Narcissism (self-centeredness) undermines intimacy and drives a person more in the direction of isolation.
10. A harsh superego (self-criticism) can undermine intimacy, just as easily as a self-indulgent id.
11. The person who is a workaholic may be psychologically unavailable to his or her children at home, thus producing children who are emotionally inhibited and who tend to be more isolated.
12. Researchers have strong evidence of the connection between lack of intimacy and the use of chemical substances to counteract the pain of the lack of intimacy.
13. A paraphilia is considered a sexual deviancy. Paraphilias are voyeurism, fetishism, transvestitism, bestiality, homosexuality (the debate on this issue is ongoing). Paraphilias tend to be sexual experiences without intimacy. Sex for deviants often becomes an obsession or an addiction in persons who retreat more and more into isolation.
14. Incest and child molestation are felonious criminal offenses, punishable with prison sentences.
15. Sidney Jourard became quite famous for suggesting that self-disclosure helps change a person's shy-isolationist behavior into more outgoing-intimate behavior.
16. To fight off a slow retreat into isolation-type lifestyles a person needs to believe that the intimacy-friendship lifestyles are both better and possible to obtain.
17. Reciprocity of self-disclosure means that two people must both ask questions about things of mutual interest, and share feelings about deeper beliefs and ideas.
18. The theory of Complementarity is a idea that two different kinds of people need each other to fill their needs. While this works for many persons, it is better for a person to look for a partner who is more similar than dissimilar.
19. There are three Greek words that represent three components When these three are combined they make the best kind of a loving marriage relationship; eros (erotic and ideals), philos (intimate friendship), agape (putting the other first, caring, serving, sacrificing).
20. Sharing feeling skills (Chapter 3), Fear reduction skills (Chapter 5) and Communication skills (Chapter 14) need to be combined to increase self-disclosure and intimacy.




WordPerfect 11 Document
LIFESKILLS FOR MOVING UP                     ORIGINATOR OF THE SKILL
                                                                                 or well-known user/promoter

Intentionality (Ch. 1)      Rollo May
Positive Stroking, libidinal nourishment (Ch. 1, 2)      Sigmund Freud, Eric Berne, Claude Steiner