Disclosure and Secrecy in Adolescent–Parent Relationships

Child Development, January/February 2006, Volume 77, Number 1, Pages 201 – 217
Disclosure and Secrecy in Adolescent–Parent Relationships
Judith G. Smetana, Aaron Metzger, Denise C. Gettman, and Nicole Campione-Barr
University of Rochester
Beliefs about parents’ legitimate authority and adolescents’ obligations to disclose to parents and actual disclosure
and secrecy in different domains were examined in 276 ethnically diverse, lower middle-class 9th and
12th graders (Ms 5 14.62 and 17.40 years) and their parents (n 5 249). Adolescents were seen as more obligated
to disclose prudential issues and less obligated to disclose personal than moral, conventional, and multifaceted
issues; parents viewed adolescents as more obligated to disclose to parents than adolescents perceived themselves
to be. Adolescents disclosed more to mothers than to fathers, particularly regarding personal issues, but
mothers overestimated girls’ disclosure. Greater trust, perceived obligations to disclose, and, for personal issues,
more parental acceptance and psychological control predicted more disclosure and less secrecy.
Recent research has highlighted the importance of
children’s disclosure as a source of parental knowledge
about children’s activities (Crouter & Head,
2002; Kerr & Stattin, 2000; Kerr, Stattin, & Trost, 1999;
Stattin & Kerr, 2000). Although a great deal of research
indicates that parental monitoring becomes
increasingly important in adolescence, as adolescents
spend less time with parents and more time
with peers (Csikszentmihalyi & Larson, 1984; Hetherington,
1993; Larson, Richards, Moneta, Holmbeck,
& Duckett, 1996), Crouter and Head (2002)
have noted that most of the research has assessed
parental monitoring in terms of parents’ knowledge
of children’s activities and that parental knowledge
can be obtained in various ways. Kerr and Stattin
(2000), Kerr et al. (1999), and Stattin and Kerr (2000)
distinguished among child disclosure, parental solicitation
of information, and parental behavioral
control and found that, controlling for trust in the
parent – child relationship, only adolescent disclosure
was associated with lower levels of juvenile
delinquency and adolescent conduct problems (but
see Fletcher, Steinberg, & Williams, 2004, who found
that parental control contributed significantly to parental
knowledge and also to reductions in juvenile
delinquency). Furthermore, Kerr et al. (1999) found
We thank Dr. Kenneth Hilton, the Rush-Henrietta School District,
and the many families who participated in this research. We
are also grateful to Aparajita Biswas, Emily Locker, Gregory
Sherman, Pia Weston, and Alexandra Rivera for their assistance
with this study.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to
Judith Smetana, Department of Clinical and Social Sciences in
Psychology, Meliora Hall, RC 270266, University of Rochester,
Rochester, NY 14627. Electronic mail may be sent to smetana
@psych.rochester.edu.
that adolescents who are more disclosing view their
parents as more trusting of them.
These findings are intriguing, because they shift
the focus of this large body of research from
parenting practices to adolescents’ active management
of information about their lives. Yet the findings
are incomplete, both conceptually and
methodologically. As adolescents spend more time
away from home, they have increased opportunities
to manage information, keep things secret, and make
choices about disclosure, but Kerr and Stattin (2000)
did not systematically consider what adolescents
disclose or are secretive about. Adolescents may
choose to reveal or conceal information to parents for
different reasons, including attempts to assert power
or manipulate parents (Stattin, Kerr, & Ferrer-
Wreder, 2000), avoid disapproval (Marshall, Tilton-
Weaver, & Bosdet, 2005; Stattin et al., 2000), gain
autonomy (Finkenauer, Engels, & Meeus, 2002;
Marshall et al., 2005), or because they increasingly
view some aspects of their behavior as private matters
and inappropriate to disclose to parents. Furthermore,
teenagers’ management of information
may vary for different types of activities and the
extent to which they believe those activities may
elicit parental concern.
Youniss and Smollar (1985) found that adolescent
boys and girls talk to both mothers and fathers about
schoolwork, future plans, and social issues, but they
do not communicate much about issues like dating
(although they disclose more to mothers than fathers).
Likewise, Noller and Callan (1990) found that,
in general, adolescents reported not disclosing much
to their parents, with adolescent girls reporting more
disclosure to mothers than to fathers and adolescent
r 2006 by the Society for Research in Child Development, Inc.
All rights reserved. 0009-3920/2006/7701-0014

202 Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-Barr
boys reporting equal disclosure to mothers and fathers
about relationships, sexual attitudes and information,
and plans. Although these studies are
informative, they lack a conceptual framework and a
more systematic approach for understanding the
types of issues that adolescents disclose or conceal
from parents.
Moreover, Kerr and Stattin (2000) and Stattin and
Kerr (2000) examined disclosure as assessed by five
questions: whether adolescents spontaneously tell,
like to tell, usually tell, keep a lot of secrets, or hide
their everyday activities from their parents. Previous
research has shown that disclosure and secrecy are
only moderately (and inversely) correlated (Finkenauer
et al., 2002), as are disclosure and concealment
(Finkenauer, Frijns, Engels, & Kerkhof, 2005),
but they were combined in Kerr and Stattin’s (2000)
measures. Kerr and Stattin (2000) found that greater
disclosure was associated with more positive outcomes,
but Finkenauer et al. (2002) found that for
both early (12- to 13-year-olds) and late (16- to 18year-olds)
adolescents, secrecy (but not disclosure)
was associated with poorer relationships with parents,
more physical complaints, and more depressed
mood. Moreover, adolescents’ disclosure and concealment
(as rated by parents) each have unique
associations with parenting (Finkenauer et al., 2005).
This research suggests that disclosure and secrecy
are empirically distinct, perhaps because they vary
conceptually in the extent to which they may entail
acts of omission versus commission.
Research from the perspective of social domain
theory (Nucci, 1996; Smetana, 1995, 2006; Turiel,
1983, 1998) may provide a useful way of conceptualizing
these issues. Previous research (Fuligni, 1998;
Smetana, 1988a, 2000; Smetana & Asquith, 1994) has
shown that adolescents consistently reject parents’
legitimate authority to regulate personal issues,
which pertain to control over one’s body, privacy,
and choices regarding issues such as clothes, hairstyles,
or recreational activities. Personal issues are
seen as not having consequences for others and are
therefore viewed as beyond the boundaries of legitimate
moral and conventional concern. Adolescents’
rejection of legitimate parental authority and their
claims to jurisdiction over personal issues suggest
that adolescents assert an ‘‘arena of privacy’’
(Buhrmester & Prager, 1995) over these issues and
they may believe that they are not obligated to disclose
personal issues to parents. With age, adolescents
also increasingly assert autonomy over
multifaceted issues, which entail overlaps between
domains. For instance, keeping the bedroom clean
may be seen as a conventional issue by parents and a
personal issue by adolescents; likewise, some
friendship issues may entail overlapping conventional,
prudential, psychological, and personal concerns.
As parents generally believe that they have
more authority over personal and multifaceted issues
than adolescents desire, parents may view adolescents
as being more obligated to disclose these
issues than adolescents believe. However, previous
research has not examined adolescents’ or parents’
perceptions of adolescents’ obligations to disclose
information in different domains. Furthermore,
whether adolescents actually disclose these issues to
parents may vary according to the nature of the
parent – adolescent relationship.
In contrast, previous research has shown that
adolescents and parents agree that parents should
have legitimate authority over moral issues (which
pertain to justice, welfare, or rights), conventional issues
(the arbitrary norms, like etiquette and manners,
that facilitate the smooth functioning of social
systems), and prudential issues (which pertain to the
individual’s comfort, safety, or health; Fuligni, 1998;
Smetana, 1988a, 2000; Smetana & Asquith, 1994). In
turn, this suggests that adolescents may believe that
they are obligated to disclose their moral, conventional,
and prudential behavior to parents.
Finally, Finkenauer et al. (2002) also found that
adolescents’ self-disclosure was negatively associated
and secrecy was positively associated with emotional
autonomy, as assessed on Steinberg and
Silverberg’s (1986) emotional autonomy measure.
They interpreted these findings as demonstrating
that secrecy has both positive and negative benefits
during adolescence. Most researchers have viewed
Steinberg and Silverberg’s measure as assessing detachment
rather than healthy individuation (e.g.,
Ryan & Lynch, 1989). Therefore, whether secrecy has
positive benefits during adolescence remains unclear,
although the available research is consistent in
indicating that adolescent disclosure leads to better
adjustment (Kerr & Stattin, 2000; Stattin & Kerr,
2000). As Crouter and Head (2002) have suggested,
more information on the correlates of disclosure and
secrecy is needed.
The present study brought together these different
lines of research to examine disclosure and secrecy
and their correlates in adolescent – parent relationships.
The first aim of the study was to extend previous
research on beliefs about the legitimacy of
parental authority in different social-cognitive domains
to examine adolescents’ and parents’ beliefs
about adolescents’ obligations to disclose moral,
conventional, prudential, multifaceted, and personal
issues. On the basis of previous research (Smetana,

1988a, 2000; Smetana & Asquith, 1994), we hypothesized
that judgments of legitimate parental authority
would be highly associated with obligations
to disclose to parents and that both adolescents and
parents would view adolescents as more obligated to
disclose moral, conventional, and prudential issues
rather than multifaceted and personal issues. Furthermore,
we hypothesized that generation and adolescents’
age would moderate these findings and
that parents would view adolescents as more obligated
to disclose to parents, particularly regarding
multifaceted and personal issues, than adolescents
believed they were obligated to do. We also hypothesized
that adolescents’ obligations to disclose
issues in all domains, but particularly in the personal
domain, would decline with age. Because previous
research on parental authority beliefs has revealed
few systematic sex differences, sex differences in
beliefs about disclosure were examined, but no specific
hypotheses were tested.
The second aim of this study was to examine adolescents’
(and for disclosure, parents’) perceptions
of actual disclosure and secrecy to parents. We focused
here on everyday issues to ensure that the issues
examined afforded frequent opportunities for
disclosure or concealment. Thus, we examined perceptions
of disclosure and secrecy regarding schoolwork
(such as whether homework was completed or
how students are doing on different subjects in
school), peer issues (like whether parents are home
when teens are at other friends’ houses or whether
they are dating), and personal issues (how adolescents
spend their free time or what they talk about on
the phone with friends). Although academic issues
can be conceptualized as primarily prudential in
nature (e.g., having to do with potential long-term
harm or benefit to the self), this differs from the
prudential issues examined in both the current assessment
and previous research on the legitimacy of
parental authority, which has focused on prudential
issues of risk, such as drug and alcohol use or sexual
activity (e.g., Smetana, 2000; Smetana & Asquith,
1994). The peer issues examined here were consistent
with the multifaceted friendship issues examined in
previous research on the legitimacy of parental authority
in that they included both personal and potentially
conventional or prudential concerns.
On the basis of results of Finkenauer et al. (2002,
2005), we expected that adolescents’ disclosure to
parents would be only moderately and inversely
associated with their ratings of secrecy or concealment
from parents about the same issues. We also
examined age, sex, and topic differences in adolescents’
disclosure and secrecy and generation differ-
Disclosure in Adolescence 203
ences in disclosure. We expected that adolescents
would disclose more and conceal less about academic
than personal or peer issues and that they
would disclose more and conceal less about peer
than personal issues. Furthermore, previous research
on disclosure has focused primarily on middle adolescence
(Kerr & Stattin, 2000; Stattin & Kerr, 2000) or
has not distinguished between middle and late adolescence
(Darling, Cumsille, Hames, & Caldwell,
2004). In this study, we examined middle (9th graders)
and late adolescents’ (12th graders’) secrecy and
disclosure regarding these different topics. On the
basis of the previous research (Buhrmester & Prager,
1995; Finkenauer et al., 2002; Youniss & Smollar,
1985), we hypothesized that adolescents’ disclosure
of personal issues to parents would decrease with
age. Furthermore, we hypothesized that adolescents
would disclose less, particularly at older ages and
regarding personal issues, than parents perceived.
Furthermore, Crouter and Head (2002) have criticized
past research on parenting as focusing globally
on ‘‘parents’’ rather than assessing parenting separately
for mothers and fathers. Thus, in this study,
adolescents separately rated their disclosure and secrecy
toward mothers and fathers. On the basis of the
previous research, which has shown that disclosure
varies for mothers and fathers and interacts with
child gender (Bumpus, Crouter, & McHale, 2001;
Crouter, Helms-Erikson, Updegraff, & McHale, 1999;
Noller & Callan, 1990; Waizenhofer, Buchanan, &
Jackson-Newsom, 2004; Youniss & Smollar, 1985), we
expected that adolescents, and particularly girls,
would report greater disclosure overall to mothers
than to fathers but that adolescent boys would disclose
personal issues more to fathers than to mothers.
The final aim of this study was to examine the
correlates of adolescent disclosure and secrecy regarding
these different types of issues. We examined
the unique influences of adolescents’ beliefs about
their obligations to disclose to parents, parenting
(including acceptance and psychological control),
and the quality of parent – adolescent relationships
on disclosure and secrecy. We hypothesized that
adolescents who viewed themselves as more obligated
to disclose to parents would disclose more and
conceal less. We also expected that the quality of the
parent – adolescent relationship would influence
both disclosure and secrecy, but that different dimensions
would be important for each. Based on
Kerr et al.’s (1999) findings, we expected that trust
(both parents’ perceptions of trust in their adolescents
and adolescents’ perceptions of trust in
their parents) would be associated with disclosure
regarding all three types of issues. However, we

204 Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-Barr
hypothesized that adolescents’ trust in parents
would be more positively associated with disclosure
regarding personal issues and more negatively associated
with secrecy over personal than other issues.
On the basis of the results of Finkenauer et al.
(2002), we expected that more problematic parent –
adolescent relationships, including greater conflict,
would be associated with greater secrecy (but not
disclosure), particularly over peer issues. Finally, on
the basis of recent research, which has linked parental
psychological control specifically with parental
overcontrol of adolescents’ personal domains
(Hasebe, Nucci, & Nucci, 2004; Smetana & Daddis,
2002), we expected that more parental psychological
control would be associated with greater secrecy
over personal issues, whereas greater acceptance
would be associated with greater disclosure over
personal issues.
Methods
Participants/Sample
The sample for this study consisted of 276 adolescents,
154 9th graders (M 5 14.62 years, SD 5 0.51,
n 5 53 males and 101 females) and 122 12th graders
(M 5 17.40 years, SD 5 0.47, n 5 42 males and 80 females),
and their parents (n 5 249: 210 mothers and
39 fathers). Boys and girls in each grade did not
differ significantly in age. The adolescents were 70%
European American, 9% African American, 9%
Asian, 7% biracial, 4% Hispanic, and 2% other. Most
participating students lived in two-parent families
with two biological parents (72%); the remainder
resided in stepparent families (7%), single-parent
families (19%, of which nearly all were motherheaded
households), or other (2%). Family structure
and adolescents’ race/ethnicity (examined in terms
of European American vs. all else) did not differ
significantly by adolescents’ grade or sex.
Participating mothers and fathers were, on average,
43.50 and 45.67 years old, respectively
(SDs 5 5.00 and 5.82 years). Twenty-eight percent of
both mothers and fathers had a high school diploma
or less, 45% of mothers and 37% of fathers had
completed some college, and the remaining parents
had obtained a college degree or higher (8% of
mothers and 15% of fathers had graduate degrees).
Parents were primarily lower middle-class, as assessed
on the socioeconomic index (SEI; Nakao &
Treas, 1992). Scores on the SEI can range from 1 to
100, with higher scores indicating greater occupational
prestige (Ms 5 46.64 and 52.26 for mothers and
fathers, SDs 5 15.50 and 18.48). Finally, adolescents
with parents participating or not participating in the
study did not differ in sociodemographic background,
except that adolescents with a participating
parent were more likely to come from two biological
parent families than adolescents whose parents did
not respond (72% vs. 56%).
Assessments of Parental Authority Legitimacy and
Obligations to Disclose
Stimuli. The stimuli for these assessments were 20
hypothetical issues grouped into prudential, moral
and conventional, multifaceted, and personal categories
(see Appendix A for the items). Based on pilot
testing and previous research (Smetana & Daddis,
2002; Smetana, Campione-Barr, & Daddis, 2004), the
moral and conventional items were combined to
form a single socially regulated dimension. The definitions
of the domains and the selection of items
were based on previous theorizing and research
(Smetana, 1988a, 2000; Smetana & Asquith, 1994), as
well as pilot testing.
Legitimacy ratings. Adolescents and parents rated
the extent to which it is okay for parents to make
rules or set expectations about each item, assessing
the legitimacy of parental authority. Respondents rated
the legitimacy of parental authority on a 5-point
scale ranging from 1 (absolutely not) to5(definitely,
yes). Thus, higher scores indicated greater legitimacy
of parental authority. as for adolescents’ ratings of
prudential, socially regulated (moral and conventional),
multifaceted, and personal items were .89,
.74, .77, and .76, respectively, and for parents’ ratings
were .91, .77, .81, and .74, respectively.
Obligations to disclose. Adolescents and parents
also rated whether children ‘‘should tell parents what
they are doing, that is whether they have a duty or
obligation to tell parents about their behavior,’’ assessing
their judgments of their obligations to disclose
to parents. Obligations were rated on the same 5point
scale as for legitimacy, with higher scores indicating
greater obligation. as were .89, .87, .78, and
.77 for adolescents’ ratings of prudential, social,
multifaceted, and personal items, respectively, and
.92, .83, .81, and .75 for parents’ ratings.
Assessments of Disclosure and Secrecy
Adolescent disclosure. Adolescents and parents
rated how often they ‘‘usually tell or are willing to
tell their mother (or father), without them asking’’
about 12 personal, peer, and schoolwork issues,
listed in Appendix A. As can be seen, the same
personal items used in the assessment of beliefs

about legitimate parental authority and obligations
to disclose were used in the assessment of disclosure.
Respondents were instructed to consider how much
they (or their adolescents) disclose or are willing to
disclose to each parent, rather than whether they
actually engage in each behavior. Adolescents completed
the ratings separately for disclosure to mothers
and fathers. Responses were rated on a 5-point
scale ranging from 1 (never tell)to5(always tell). as for
disclosure regarding personal, schoolwork, and peer
issues were .81, .78, and .68 for adolescents’ ratings of
mothers, .77, .80, and .67 for adolescents’ ratings of
fathers, and .78, .86, and .68 for parents’ ratings.
Adolescent secrecy. Secrecy was rated regarding the
same set of items used to assess disclosure. Adolescents
rated how often they ‘‘keep secret or try to hide
what you are doing from your mother (father)’’ on a 5point
scale ranging from 1 (never) to5(always). Again,
ratings were completed separately for each parent. as
for ratings of secrecy regarding personal, schoolwork,
and peer issues were .78, .76, and .68 for ratings of
mothers and .80, .80, and .70 for ratings of fathers.
Correlates of Disclosure and Secrecy
Trust. Adolescents completed the Trust subscale
(10 items) of the Parent – Peer Attachment Inventory
(PPAI; Armsden & Greenberg, 1987), which assesses
adolescents’ trust in parents. Responses were scored
on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (almost never
or never true) to5(almost always or always true). Adolescents
completed the questionnaire twice, once
for mothers (a 5 .74) and once for fathers (a 5 .77).
The items were reworded to assess parents’ trust in
their adolescent (a 5 .69). Adolescents’ ratings of
trust in mothers and fathers were significantly associated,
r(263) 5 .43 (except where otherwise noted,
all pso.01); ratings of mothers and fathers were
combined for the analyses.
Adolescent – parent conflict. Adolescents and parents
rated 11 different areas of day-to-day decision
making (dress or clothing, helping out around the
house, homework, time to be home, choice or volume
of music or TV, time spent on the phone, who
should be friends, bedroom, spending or managing
money, dating), drawn from previous research on
adolescent – parent conflict (Smetana, 1989). Using
procedures derived from the Issues Checklist (Prinz,
Foster, Kent, & O’Leary, 1979; Robin & Foster, 1989),
respondents indicated whether each issue was discussed
during the past 2 weeks (scored as 0 5 not
discussed or 1 5 discussed). Then, for each issue discussed,
respondents rated the frequency of discussion
during the previous 2 weeks on a scale ranging from
Disclosure in Adolescence 205
1(not often) to4(very often) and the intensity of discussion
during the previous 2 weeks on a 5-point
scale ranging from 1 (calm) to5(angry). Adolescents
completed these ratings separately for mothers and
fathers. Ratings of mothers and fathers were significantly
associated for both frequency, r(247) 5 .56,
and intensity, r(245) 5 .43; thus, scores for mothers
and fathers were combined for both variables.
Parenting. Parents rated their parenting on the
Acceptance/Rejection and Psychological Control
subscales (10 items each) of the Children’s Report of
Parents’ Behavior Inventory (CRPBI; Schaefer, 1965a,
1965b; Schludermann & Schludermann, 1970). Parents
rated each item on a 3-point scale ranging from
1(not like the parent) to3(a lot like the parent). as for
the two scales were .73 and .58.
Self-esteem. Adolescents rated each of 10 items on
the Rosenberg (1986) Self-Esteem Inventory on a 4point
scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 4
(strongly agree; a 5 .87).
Procedures
Adolescents and their parents were recruited from
a suburban school district. Researchers visited all
9th- and 12th-grade homerooms to inform students
about the research. Interested students took the
survey packages (for both students and parents)
home. Because of the number of single-parent families
in the district, only one parent per family was
asked to complete the surveys. Students were offered
small honoraria for their participation. Completed
surveys were returned in school or, in a few cases,
mailed back to the research team.
Participation rates, based on the number of students
in each grade and the average daily absence
rates for those grades, were 33% for the 9th grade and
27% for the 12th grade. The race/ethnicity and socioeconomic
status of our sample closely matched the
demographic characteristics of the district, which
was primarily lower middle-class and 78% White, 9%
African American, 1% American Indian, 7% Asian,
and 4% Hispanic. Participating students were slightly
above the district average in academic achievement
(assessed by self-reported grade point average), and
girls were overrepresented in our sample.
Results
Legitimacy of Parental Authority and Adolescents’
Obligations to Disclose to Parents
Means and standard deviations for adolescents’
and parents’ judgments of the legitimacy of parental

206 Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-Barr
authority and adolescents’ obligations to disclose
their behavior in different domains are reported in
Table 1. Our hypothesis that ratings of the legitimacy
of parental authority and obligations to disclose to
parents would be highly associated was confirmed.
Total ratings were strongly correlated for adolescents,
r(275) 5 .59, and parents, r(249) 5 .62. However,
although statistically significant, associations
between parents’ and adolescents’ ratings of the legitimacy
of parental authority, r(249) 5 .20, and obligations
to disclose to parents, r(249) 5 .29, were
only moderate.
To test hypotheses about domain, age, and generation
differences, separate 2 (grade) 2 (sex) 2
(generation: parent vs. child) 4 (domain) repeated
measures analyses of variance (ANOVAs) with
generation and domain as repeated measures were
performed on ratings for the two judgments. As
hypothesized, parents were seen as having significantly
less legitimate authority, F(1, 236) 5 6.17, and
adolescents were perceived as being significantly
less obligated to disclose to parents as they got older,
F(1, 237) 5 7.94. Also consistent with expectations,
parents viewed parents as having significantly more
legitimate authority, F(1, 237) 5 239.14, and adolescents
as having significantly more of an obligation to
disclose to parents, F(1, 237) 5 220.30, than did adolescents.
Furthermore, significant main effects for
domain in ratings of legitimacy, F(3, 708) 5 523.69,
Table 1
Means and Standard Deviations for Ratings of Legitimacy of Parental Authority and Obligations to Disclose
and obligations to disclose, F(3, 711) 5 327.23, revealed
that prudential issues were seen as more legitimately
subject to parental authority and more
obligatory to disclose than all other issues (Bonferroni
t-tests, all pso.01). In turn, socially regulated
(moral and conventional) items were seen as more
legitimately subject to parental authority than multifaceted
and personal issues. In contrast, adolescents
were seen as more obligated to tell parents
about their behavior vis-à-vis multifaceted issues
than moral, conventional, and personal issues. As
hypothesized, personal issues were seen as less obligatory
to disclose and less legitimately subject to
parental authority than all other issues.
Findings regarding the legitimacy of parental authority
were qualified by significant Generation
Grade, F(1, 236) 5 4.93, p 5 .03, Generation Domain,
F(3, 708) 5 42.76, and Domain Grade
Generation interactions, F(3, 708) 5 4.50. For obligations
to disclose to parents, there was a significant
Generation Domain interaction, F(3, 711) 5 20.49,
and the three-way interaction approached significance,
F(3, 711) 5 2.56, p 5 .054. Post hoc analyses
revealed that there were no significant age differences
in 9th and 12th graders’ ratings of the legitimacy
of parental authority for any of the domains,
but parents of 9th graders viewed parental authority
as more legitimate for multifaceted, socially regulated
(moral and conventional), and personal issues
Legitimacy of parental authority Obligation to disclose
Adolescents Parents Adolescents Parents
9th 12th M 9th 12th M 9th 12th M 9th 12th M
Prudential
M 4.17 3.96 4.05 4.73 4.52 4.64 3.63 3.33 3.51 4.74 4.55 4.66
SD 1.12 0.98 1.08 0.88 0.92 0.90 1.37 1.28 1.30 0.75 0.70 0.73
Social
M 2.91 2.89 2.90 4.29 4.05 4.19 2.89 2.66 2.79 4.07 3.80 3.96
SD 0.99 0.94 0.92 0.72 0.86 0.75 1.09 1.02 0.96 0.73 0.75 0.75
Multifac
M 2.76 2.74 2.75 4.24 3.75 4.05 3.25 3.18 3.22 4.29 3.90 4.12
SD 0.91 0.85 0.87 0.72 0.79 0.78 1.02 0.89 0.94 0.70 0.71 0.73
Personal
M 2.11 2.18 2.15 3.16 2.80 3.02 2.55 2.49 2.52 3.35 3.07 3.23
SD 0.88 0.79 0.83 0.80 0.79 0.81 0.88 0.86 0.87 0.78 0.68 0.75
Total
M 3.02 2.98 3.00 4.12 3.79 3.99 3.09 2.91 3.01 4.11 3.84 4.00
SD 0.82 0.71 0.77 0.59 0.65 0.64 0.91 0.85 0.88 0.62 0.59 0.62
Note. Multifac 5 Multifaceted; Social 5 Moral and Conventional. Items were rated on 5-point scales where higher scores 5 more legitimate
parental authority and greater obligation to disclose to parents.

(but only marginally, for prudential issues) than did
parents of 12th graders. As expected, parents viewed
their adolescents as significantly less obligated to
disclose their activities in each domain as they got
older. However, similar age-related decreases in adolescents’
ratings of their obligation to voluntarily
disclose their behavior to parents approached significance
for moral and conventional (po.07) and
prudential issues (po.055), although adolescents
consistently rated personal issues as less obligatory
than all other issues.
Overview and Descriptive Findings for Disclosure and
Secrecy
Means and standard deviations for adolescents’
ratings of disclosure and secrecy regarding personal,
peer, and schoolwork issues for mothers and fathers
and their interrelationships are presented in Table 2.
As can be seen, mean levels of disclosure and secrecy
were both moderate.
Because we selected the peer issues from a larger
set of multifaceted issues used to assess legitimate
parental authority, the items, by definition, entailed
overlaps between the domains. Thus, high correlations
between personal and peer issues would be
expected, and this is what we found. However, there
were strong associations among ratings of disclosure
regarding all three types of issues. In contrast, while
adolescents’ ratings of secrecy regarding personal
and peer issues were highly correlated, as would be
expected, the remaining associations were moderate,
supporting their distinction. For both disclosure and
secrecy, adolescents’ ratings of mothers and fathers
were very strongly associated, but when considering
both mothers and fathers, adolescents’ ratings of
disclosure and secrecy showed the expected moderate
but negative associations.
Adolescent Disclosure and Secrecy
Although adolescents’ ratings of mothers and fathers
were strongly associated, the results in Table 2
also suggest that there were mean level differences in
adolescents’ ratings of their parents. Thus, in the
next set of analyses, 2 (adolescents’ sex) 2 (sex of
parent) 2 (grade) 3 (topic) repeated measures
ANOVAs with sex of parent and topic as repeated
measures were run to examine the hypothesized
grade, sex of parent, sex of adolescent, and topic
differences in secrecy and disclosure. (There was a
slightly smaller n in these analyses than in the pre- 2
vious analyses because not all adolescents rated a
father. Parent – adolescent differences in ratings of Table
Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations Among Adolescents’ Ratings of Disclosure and Secrecy
Disclose ! Mother Disclose ! Father Secrecy ! Mother Secrecy ! Father
School Peer Pers School Peer Pers School Peer Pers School Peer
M SD
Disclose ! M Pers 2.83 0.94 0.61 0.68 0.77 0.46 0.50 0.43 0.23 0.40 0.33 0.20 0.28
Disclose ! M School 3.82 0.94 1.00 0.54 0.47 0.77 0.38 0.22 0.34 0.27 0.14 0.30 0.20
Disclosure in Adolescence 207
Disclose ! M Peer 2.98 1.18 1.00 0.52 0.42 0.79 0.39 0.23 0.51 0.28 0.15 0.38
Disclosure ! F Pers 2.49 0.87 1.00 0.62 0.68 0.34 0.21 0.31 0.39 0.25 0.37
Disclosure ! F School 3.59 1.08 1.00 0.53 0.10 0.25 0.14 0.16 0.30 0.20
Disclosure ! F Peer 2.68 1.03 1.00 0.29 0.14 0.37 0.37 0.17 0.44
Secrecy ! M Pers 2.60 0.93 1.00 0.38 0.65 0.82 0.34 0.54
Secrecy ! M School 2.16 0.98 1.00 0.38 0.22 0.80 0.29
Secrecy ! M Peer 2.74 1.15 1.00 0.51 0.33 0.81
Secrecy ! F Pers 2.71 0.99 1.00 0.22 0.51
Secrecy ! F School 2.25 1.05 1.00 0.33
Secrecy ! F Peer 2.87 1.23 1.00
Note. M5Mother; F 5 Father; Pers 5 Personal; Underlining 5 ns. Items were rated on 5-point scales where higher scores 5 more disclosure and greater secrecy.
po.05, all other ps o.01.

208 Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-Barr
disclosure were examined in a separate analysis,
described in more detail below.)
Adolescent secrecy. Means and standard deviations
for adolescents’ ratings of secrecy toward mothers
and fathers are shown in Table 3. Adolescents were
more secretive about peer than personal issues or
schoolwork and more secretive about personal issues
than schoolwork, F(2, 246) 5 34.10. A significant Sex
of Child Sex of Parent interaction, F(1, 248) 5 5.64,
was qualified by a significant Sex of Child Sex of
Parent Topic interaction, F(2, 496) 5 3.61. Boys
concealed personal issues from mothers more than
girls did, F(1, 248) 5 4.79.
A significant Topic Grade interaction,
F(2, 496) 5 7.06, revealed that 9th graders were more
secretive about peers than either schoolwork or
personal issues and more secretive about personal
issues than schoolwork, Ms 5 2.87, 2.68, 2.11,
SDs 5 1.21, 0.93, 0.98, respectively. In contrast, 12th
graders did not differentiate between personal and
peer issues, although they hid both more than
schoolwork, Ms 5 2.59, 2.69, 2.29, SDs 5 0.89, 1.02,
0.93, respectively. These findings were qualified by a
significant Grade Child’s Sex Topic interaction,
F(2, 496) 5 5.40, which was due to a Grade Child’s
Sex interaction for schoolwork, F(3, 269) 5 2.84. Post
Table 3
Means and Standard Deviations for Adolescents’ Ratings of Disclosure and Secrecy to Parents
hoc tests indicated that 12th-grade boys kept secrets
about schoolwork more than did either 12th-grade
girls or 9th-grade boys (see Table 3).
Adolescent disclosure. Adolescents’ ratings of disclosure
to mothers and fathers are also presented in
Table 3. As hypothesized, adolescents reported voluntarily
disclosing more to mothers than to fathers,
F(1, 252) 5 52.66, Ms 5 3.16, 2.92, SDs 5 0.85, 0.90,
respectively. Mirroring the results for secrecy, adolescents
also disclosed more about schoolwork than
either peers or personal issues and more about peers
than personal issues, F(2, 504) 5 175.87.
A significant Sex of Child Sex of Parent interaction,
F(1, 252) 5 10.54, was qualified by a significant
Sex of Child Sex of Parent Topic interaction,
F(2, 504) 5 6.39. Post hoc analyses revealed that, as
expected, girls disclosed more about personal issues,
Ms 5 2.96, 2.65, SDs 5 0.94, 0.87, and schoolwork,
Ms 5 3.93, 3.69, SDs 5 0.90, 0.91, respectively, to their
mothers than did boys, but boys and girls did not
differ in their voluntary disclosure to mothers about
peers. Contrary to hypotheses, there were no differences
in boys’ and girls’ disclosure to fathers.
In addition, a significant Topic Grade interaction,
F(2, 504) 5 10.60 revealed that 12th graders voluntarily
disclosed more about peers than did 9th graders,
Regarding mothers Regarding fathers
Boys Girls Boys Girls
9th 12th M 9th 12th M 9th 12th M 9th 12th M
Disclosure
Personal
M 2.59 2.73 2.65 2.94 2.98 2.96 2.40 2.63 2.51 2.52 2.45 2.49
SD 0.93 0.81 0.87 0.93 0.94 0.94 0.90 0.76 0.85 0.87 0.88 0.87
School
M 3.84 3.52 3.69 3.97 3.87 3.93 3.65 3.29 3.49 3.70 3.57 3.64
SD 0.99 0.79 0.91 0.91 0.89 0.90 1.07 0.91 1.01 1.13 1.09 1.11
Peer
M 2.72 3.13 2.91 2.98 3.19 3.08 2.65 3.00 2.81 2.55 2.77 2.65
SD 1.08 1.04 1.08 1.26 1.78 1.22 1.14 1.06 1.11 1.21 1.21 1.21
Secrecy
Personal
M 2.78 2.72 2.79 2.55 2.48 2.52 2.77 2.68 2.73 2.76 2.59 2.69
SD 0.95 0.92 0.95 0.93 0.92 0.93 1.02 0.93 0.98 1.02 0.99 1.00
School
M 2.10 2.57 2.34 2.07 2.09 2.12 2.17 2.58 2.36 2.17 2.23 2.20
SD 1.03 1.00 1.04 0.99 0.90 0.95 1.00 1.06 1.05 1.09 1.02 1.06
Peers
M 2.97 2.53 2.85 2.71 2.70 2.68 3.07 2.50 2.81 2.90 2.87 2.90
SD 1.17 0.88 1.06 1.26 1.13 1.21 1.20 1.02 1.15 1.35 1.18 1.27

Table 4
Means and Standard Deviations for Adolescents’ and Mothers’ Ratings
of Disclosure
Adolescents (rating
mothers) Mothers
9th grade 12th grade 9th grade 12th grade
Boys Girls Boys Girls Boys Girls Boys Girls
Personal
M 2.57 2.87 2.81 3.06 2.72 3.31 2.71 3.33
SD 0.95 0.98 0.84 0.99 0.84 0.86 0.85 0.90
School
M 3.80 3.86 3.58 4.01 3.14 3.58 2.72 3.56
SD 0.90 0.96 0.90 0.81 0.90 0.84 0.84 0.97
Peers
M 2.73 2.93 3.07 3.35 3.28 3.62 2.89 3.51
SD 1.07 1.31 1.09 1.20 0.94 1.04 0.96 0.99
F(1, 173) 5 4.13, Furthermore, 12th graders disclosed
more about peers than about personal issues, whereas
9th graders did not differentiate between peers and
personal issues in their disclosure to parents.
Parent – adolescent differences in perceived disclosure.
Because most parent participants were mothers
and because the previous analyses revealed that
adolescents rated their fathers and mothers differently,
the next analyses compared adolescents’ ratings
of disclosure to mothers with mothers’
responses (n 5 202). Thus, a 2 (adolescents’ sex) 2
(grade) 2 (adolescents’ ratings of mothers vs.
mothers) 3 (topic) repeated measures ANOVA
with generation and topic as repeated measures was
performed on disclosure ratings.
A significant Generation Grade interaction,
F(1, 198) 5 6.60, indicated that mothers viewed their
9th graders as disclosing more than 9th graders reported
disclosing, Ms 5 3.36, 3.05, SDs 5 0.82, 0.79,
respectively, but 12th graders and their mothers did
not differ, Ms 5 3.24, 3.28, SDs 5 0.91, 0.86. A significant
Generation Sex interaction, F(1, 198) 5
5.94, revealed that mothers viewed their daughters
as disclosing more than girls reported disclosing,
Ms 5 3.49, 3.29, SDs 5 0.84, 0.93, but that boys’ and
their mothers’ ratings did not differ, Ms 5 3.05, 2.94,
SDs 5 0.79, 0.80.
A significant main effect for topic, F(1, 198) 5
89.24, was qualified by significant Topic Generation,
F(1, 198) 5 67.04, Topic Grade, F(1, 198) 5
3.67, and Topic Generation Grade interactions,
F(1, 198) 5 4.76. Post hoc analyses revealed that while
12th graders voluntarily told their mothers more
about their peer relations than 9th graders did, as
Disclosure in Adolescence 209
found in the previous analyses, mothers did not
differ significantly in their views of adolescents’
disclosure about these issues.
Correlates of Adolescent Disclosure and Secrecy
In the next set of analyses, we examined correlations
among the study variables, as shown in Table 5.
For ratings of the legitimacy of parental authority
and beliefs about disclosure, the moral, conventional,
and prudential items were dropped, and the
multifaceted and personal items were combined into
a single index to more closely match the issues of
disclosure and secrecy under investigation. Given
their high intercorrelations, adolescents’ ratings of
mothers and fathers were combined in these analyses
for disclosure, secrecy, trust, discussion frequency,
and conflict intensity. As expected,
adolescents’ ratings of disclosure and secrecy were
significantly and inversely correlated, r(274) 5 .46.
As can be seen, intercorrelations among the independent
variables were generally low to moderate.
We also examined correlations between adolescentrated
disclosure and secrecy and several sociodemographic
background variables, including parents’
ages, educations, SEI scores, ethnicity (White vs. all
else), and marital status (married, two-parent vs. all
else), but no significant relationships were obtained.
Next, we conducted regression analyses to examine
the unique influence of study variables on disclosure
and secrecy regarding different issues. As we had no a
priori hypotheses about the ordering of variables, all
variables were entered in a single step. Because adolescents’
beliefs about the legitimacy of parental authority
and their beliefs about their obligations to
disclose to parents were strongly correlated (r 5.51),
leading to concerns with multicollinearity, we included
only beliefs about adolescents’ obligations to
disclose to parents in the regression equations.
Therefore, adolescents’ age and sex, adolescents’
ratings of trust, discussion frequency and conflict
intensity, self-esteem, and beliefs about obligations to
disclose to parents, as well as parents’ ratings of
acceptance, psychological control, and trust in their
child were entered in the analyses. Separate analyses
were run for disclosure and secrecy regarding personal,
peer, and schoolwork issues, resulting in six
separate regressions. Preliminary analyses revealed
that parental trust was not significant in any of the
analyses, and thus it was dropped from the final
analyses. The results of the analyses are presented in
Table 6.
We also conducted exploratory analyses examining
adolescents’ separate ratings for each topic for

210 Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-Barr
Table 5
Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations Among Variables
M SD Age Sex TTrust Freq Intens Self-E Oblig PTrust Accep Psych
A Age 15.87 1.49 1.00 0.04 0.02 0.05 0.03 0.05 0.12 0.01 0.06 0.06
Sex (1 5 female) 0.66 0.48 1.00 0.13 0.17 0.18 0.10 0.13 0.04 0.10 0.01
A Trust 3.81 0.72 1.00 0.01 0.38 0.43 0.38 0.39 0.29 0.11 +
A Discussion Freq 2.15 0.63 1.00 0.52 0.06 0.23 0.09 0.01 0.07
A Conflict Intensity 2.11 1.04 1.00 0.08 0.03 0.15 0.11 +
0.18
A Self-Esteem 3.09 0.56 1.00 0.19 0.10 +
0.16 0.06
A Obligations 3.11 0.86 1.00 0.17 0.20 0.04
P Trust 4.13 0.53 1.00 0.46 0.17
P Acceptance 2.56 0.32 1.00 0.14
P - Psych Control 1.81 0.33 1.00
Disclose-Personal 2.66 0.85 0.00 0.05 0.44 0.16 0.08 0.28 0.57 0.23 0.27 0.06
Disclose-School 3.70 0.96 0.13 0.09 0.48 0.14 0.09 0.29 0.50 0.17 0.29 0.08
Disclose-Peers 2.83 1.12 0.11 +
0.00 0.40 0.14 0.10 0.18 0.50 0.19 0.13 0.01
Secrecy-Personal 2.64 0.92 0.02 0.01 0.28 0.02 0.08 0.22 0.30 0.08 0.01 0.12 +
Secrecy-School 2.19 0.96 0.12 0.10 0.25 0.01 0.12 +
0.22 0.23 0.12 +
0.10 0.02
Secrecy-Peers 2.80 1.13 0.09 0.03 0.28 0.00 0.17 0.21 0.21 0.13 0.02 0.12 +
Note. A5 Adolescent; P 5 Parent; Freq 5 Frequency; Intens 5 Intensity; Self-E 5 Self-Esteem; Auth 5 Legitimacy of Parental Authority;
Oblig 5 Obligations to Disclose; Accep 5 Acceptance; Psych 5 Psychological Control. ns ranged from 276 (for associations between adolescent-rated
measures) and 242 (for associations between parental and child reports).
+ po.10, po.05, po.01.
mothers and fathers. In these analyses, we used adolescents’
parent-specific ratings of trust, discussion
frequency, and conflict intensity, as well as measures
of parental psychological control, parental acceptance,
and beliefs about obligations to disclose used in the
previous analyses. Results differing from the combined
analyses are noted in parentheses in the text.
Unique correlates of adolescent disclosure. Older adolescents
reported greater disclosure over peer issues.
As can be seen, adolescents’ trust in parents
Table 6
Regression Models of Adolescents’ Perceptions of Disclosure and Secrecy (n 5 232)
Predictor
and adolescents’ beliefs about their obligation to
disclose to parents were statistically significant in
each analysis. Adolescents who trusted their parents
more and who believed they were more obligated to
disclose to them reported greater disclosure regarding
personal, peer, and schoolwork issues. In addition,
more parent-reported psychological control
predicted greater adolescent disclosure about personal
issues (for both mothers and fathers) and
marginally (po.07) for peer issues (for fathers only,
Disclose-Pers Disclose-School Disclose-Peer Hide-Personal Hide-School Hide-Peer
SE b SE b SE b SE b SE b SE b
A Age .03 .09 +
.03 .04 .04 .20 .04 .07 .04 .121 .05 .14
A Sex .09 .01 .11 .08 .13 .03 .13 .03 .13 .111 .16 .05
A Trust .08 .24 .09 .28 .11 .28 .11 .19 .11 .10 .13 .20
Discussion Freq .08 .06 .09 .01 .11 .10 .12 .03 .12 .02 .14 .05
Conflict Intensity .07 .01 .08 .07 .10 .04 .10 .02 .11 .10 .12 .17
Obligate ! Disclose .05 .48 .06 .38 .08 .43 .08 .25 .08 .17 .09 .15
Self-Esteem .09 .04 .10 .08 .12 .09 .12 .07 .12 .16 .14 .04
Parent Acceptance .14 .11 .16 .14 .19 .02 .20 .13 .20 .01 .23 .09
Parent Psych Control .13 .15 .15 .01 .18 .101 .18 .16 .19 .01 .22 .20
Model Total R 2
.46 .41 .38 .18 .14 .17
Note. Pers 5 Personal; A 5 Adolescent; Freq 5 Frequency; Psych 5 Psychological.
+ po.10, po.05, po.01, po.001.

5 .16, po.05). In contrast, greater parental acceptance
was associated with greater disclosure about
schoolwork (for both mothers and fathers) and personal
issues (for mothers only, b 5 .12, when examined
separately for each parent). Older adolescents
disclosed more about peer issues. Self-esteem, discussion
frequency, and conflict intensity were not
significant in the analyses of disclosure. Overall, the
variables accounted for 46%, 41%, and 38% of the
variance in adolescents’ disclosure regarding personal,
school, and peer issues, respectively.
Unique correlates of adolescent secrecy. Younger adolescents
reported greater secrecy regarding peers.
Consistent with the previous analyses, adolescents
who believed that they were more obligated to disclose
to parents kept fewer secrets regarding these
issues. In contrast to the previous analyses, however,
trust did not significantly influence adolescents’ secrecy
regarding schoolwork (owing to a nonsignificant
effect for trust in fathers, b 5 .10).
As in the previous analyses, more parental psychological
control was associated with less secrecy
regarding personal and peer issues. More parental
acceptance was associated with less secrecy regarding
personal issues, better self-esteem was associated with
less secrecy regarding schoolwork, and, as expected,
adolescents who had more intense conflicts with
parents reported more secrecy regarding peer issues
(for fathers only, b 5 .17). These variables accounted
for 18%, 14%, and 17% of the variance in secrecy regarding
personal, academic, and peer issues.
Discussion
This study extended our understanding of disclosure
and secrecy in parent – adolescent relationships in
several ways. First, using the framework of social
domain theory (Smetana, 1995, 2006; Turiel, 1983,
1998), the study demonstrated that adolescents’ and
parents’ beliefs about adolescents’ obligations to
disclose to parents were closely associated with their
beliefs about parents’ legitimate authority to regulate
acts in different social-cognitive domains and that
beliefs about disclosure were strongly associated
with adolescents’ actual disclosure. Second, the
study elaborated on recent research on adolescent
disclosure (Kerr & Stattin, 2000; Stattin & Kerr, 2000)
by examining distinctions between disclosure and
secrecy, by comparing adolescents’ and parents’
perceptions of adolescents’ disclosure, and by examining
the unique influence of different correlates
on adolescents’ disclosure and secrecy regarding
different types of activities. These issues are discussed
in turn below.
Disclosure in Adolescence 211
Beliefs About Adolescents’ Obligations to Disclose to
Parents
This study demonstrated that adolescents and
parents made conceptual domain distinctions in
their judgments of adolescents’ obligations to tell
parents about their activities and that, as hypothesized,
parent – adolescent differences and adolescents’
age (but not adolescents’ gender) moderated
these perceptions. Paralleling the findings for judgments
of the legitimacy of parental authority, both
parents and adolescents viewed adolescents as more
obligated to tell parents about their prudential behavior
and less obligated to disclose personal issues
than any other type of issue. These findings are
consistent with those of Perkins and Turiel (2005),
who found that adolescents judged it to be acceptable
to deceive parents about their moral and personal
behavior but not their prudential behavior. Consistent
with previous research (Smetana, 1988a, 2000;
Smetana & Asquith, 1994), (combined) moral and
conventional issues were judged to be more legitimately
subject to parental authority than multifaceted
and personal issues.
This ordering was reversed, however, in adolescents’
ratings of their obligations to disclose to parents;
adolescents were seen as more obligated to tell
parents about their behavior regarding multifaceted
than moral and conventional issues. Multifaceted
issues (like watching an R-rated movie or seeing
friends that parents don’t like) are at the boundaries
between parental conventional regulation (or parental
prudential concern) and adolescents’ personal
jurisdiction and, as such, have been found to be
major sources of conflict in adolescent – parent relationships
(e.g., Smetana, 1988b, 1989; Smetana &
Asquith, 1994). Therefore, it is not surprising that
both adolescents and parents viewed adolescents as
more obligated to disclose these activities than moral
or conventional behaviors, which, by adolescence,
entail well-established and taken-for-granted expectations
(Smetana & Daddis, 2002). Consistent with
the definition of personal issues as private matters
that are up to adolescents to decide (Nucci, 1996),
adolescents did not perceive themselves as obligated
to disclose personal issues to parents, whereas parents,
on average, viewed their teens as at least
sometimes obligated to tell.
Unlike previous research (Fuligni, 1998; Smetana,
1988a, 2000; Smetana & Asquith, 1994), age-related
declines in judgments of parents’ legitimate authority
to regulate acts in different domains were found only
in parents’ but not adolescents’ judgments. This could
be because this study focused on a more limited age

212 Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-Barr
range than previous studies, which typically have
spanned pre- or early to late adolescence. Furthermore,
unlike the previous research, where beliefs
about legitimate parental authority have been assessed
using binomial judgments, this study used a 5-point
Likert scale. Even though parents’ ratings of their legitimate
authority declined significantly with adolescents’
age, there were large (approximately 1-point)
differences in parents’ and 12th graders’ ratings.
Parallel findings were obtained in ratings of obligations
to disclose to parents. Parents consistently
viewed adolescents as more obligated to disclose
their behavior in each domain than adolescents
perceived, although discrepancies between parents’
and adolescents’ judgments decreased with adolescents’
increasing age, mostly because of age-related
differences in parents’ beliefs. Unlike the findings for
legitimacy, however, and most likely reflecting the
taken-for-granted nature of these expectations
(Smetana & Daddis, 2002), we did find that with age,
adolescents viewed themselves as less obligated to
disclose to parents about their moral and conventional
behavior. As expected, ratings of adolescents’
obligations to disclose to parents and the legitimacy
of parental authority were strongly associated, but
the strength of the correlations also indicated that
these constructs are not identical.
Disclosure and Secrecy
As Crouter and Head (2002) have recommended,
we examined adolescents’ ratings of disclosure and
secrecy separately for mothers and fathers. Although
these ratings were very highly associated, there were
significant mean level differences, which were further
moderated by type of issue and, as others have
found, adolescents’ sex (Bumpus et al., 2001; Crouter
et al., 1999; Noller & Callan, 1990; Waizenhofer et al.,
2004; Youniss & Smollar, 1985). Our findings are
consistent with previous research indicating that
both boys and girls, but particularly girls, have
closer, more supportive relationships with mothers
than with fathers (Furman & Buhrmester, 1992) and,
more specifically, that girls confide more in mothers
than in fathers (Noller & Callan, 1990; Youniss &
Smollar, 1985) about schoolwork and less often about
personal issues. Our findings did not support the
hypothesis that boys would voluntarily disclose
more about personal issues to fathers than mothers;
boys and girls in this study did not differ in their
disclosure or secrecy regarding any of the issues with
fathers. However, consistent with previous research
indicating that mother – daughter relationships are
closer and more supportive than mother – son rela-
tionships (Furman & Buhrmester, 1992), we found
that boys were more secretive about personal issues
with their mothers than were girls, whereas girls
disclosed more about personal issues (and also
schoolwork) to mothers than did boys. Furthermore,
mothers overestimated this disclosure and rated
their daughters as more disclosing than daughters
actually were (although no differences between
mothers and sons emerged). It has been hypothesized
that mothers identify more with their daughters
than their sons (Chodorow, 1978). In fact, we
found that girls did disclose personal issues more to
mothers than did boys, which may lead mothers to
overestimate parent – adolescent similarities. In addition,
parents have a greater ‘‘generational stake’’
(Bengston & Kuypers, 1971) in maintaining continuity
between generations, whereas adolescents, in
contrast, are attempting to differentiate from parents.
Although parents viewed adolescents as increasingly
less obligated to disclose about multifaceted
(including peer and friendship) issues with age, it
was surprising that 12th graders actually disclosed
more about these issues than did 9th graders. This
may be because conformity to peers, particularly
regarding antisocial issues, peaks in 9th grade
(Berndt, 1979; Sim & Koh, 2003). Thus, 9th graders’
secretiveness about these issues may reflect their
greater susceptibility to peer pressure at this age. As
the peer issues included an item pertaining to dating,
it is also possible that adolescents become more
willing to talk to parents about their romantic interests
and peer relationships as they get older. Finally,
it is unclear why 12th-grade boys were more secretive
about schoolwork than either same-age girls or
younger boys. The 12th graders in this study did
report lower academic performance (as assessed by
grade point averages) than did 9th graders, although
no sex differences in academic performance emerged
in our sample.
Correlates of Disclosure and Secrecy
The results of this study did not provide strong
support for Finkenauer et al.’s (2002) claim that
disclosure and secrecy are conceptually distinct. As
expected, secrecy and disclosure were significantly
and inversely correlated. Although the strength of
the association indicated that these measures are not
identical, they did have relatively similar correlates.
Consistent with the previous research (Finkenauer et
al., 2002; Kerr et al., 1999), we found that a context of
mutual trust facilitates adolescents’ disclosure to
parents over all of the issues examined here. In contrast,
secrecy over personal and peer issues was

associated with less trust in the parent – adolescent
relationship, whereas secrecy over schoolwork was
associated with lower self-esteem. Secrecy over peer
issues was also uniquely associated with greater
conflict intensity. Thus, like Finkenauer et al. (2002),
we found that disclosure has positive implications
and secrecy has negative implications for adjustment.
However, we did not find that secrecy has positive
benefits during adolescence, although our assessment
of adjustment was more limited than theirs.
It should be noted that we assessed adolescents’
perceptions of trust in parents, whereas Kerr and
colleagues (Kerr et al., 1999; Kerr & Stattin, 2000)
assessed adolescents’ perceptions of parents’ trust in
them (which we assessed directly here through
parents’ reports). Although there were significant
bivariate associations between parents’ trust in their
teens and adolescent-reported disclosure (as well as
between adolescent- and parent-rated trust), adolescents’
trust in parents was more strongly associated
with disclosure than parents’ trust in their child.
This may reflect an informant bias, but it is also interesting
to note that parents’ ratings of trust in their
adolescent were not significantly associated with
two of the three measures of secrecy.
Furthermore, consistent with other research examining
self-disclosure as an aspect of and route
toward achieving intimacy (Reis & Shaver, 1988),
Finkenauer et al. (2002, 2005) examined self-disclosure
in terms of revealing private thoughts and
feelings. Along with other researchers who have
examined disclosure as an aspect of parental
knowledge (Crouter & Head, 2002), however, this
research focused on adolescents’ voluntary disclosure
of activities (although one personal item,
‘‘having a ‘crush’ on a girl or boy,’’ referred to feelings).
Our research suggests that it is important to
specify the issues that are kept secret or disclosed, as
they have somewhat different correlates.
Differences were particularly evident for parents’
ratings of acceptance and psychological control.
Greater parental acceptance was associated with
more disclosure regarding personal issues and
schoolwork and less secrecy regarding personal issues.
As the moderate association (r 5.43) between
parental acceptance and parent-rated trust suggests,
acceptance partially indexes parents’ warmth and
support, which was shown to have a positive association
with disclosure. As adolescents (and to a
lesser extent, parents) viewed disclosure over personal
issues as discretionary rather than obligatory,
acceptance on the part of the parent may be particularly
important in creating a climate where adolescents
feel comfortable in revealing personal issues.
Disclosure in Adolescence 213
Previous research has shown that overcontrol of
the personal domain leads to greater feelings of parental
psychological control (Smetana & Daddis,
2002) and more internalizing symptoms (Hasebe et
al., 2004). Contrary to our hypotheses, the findings
from this study further suggest that greater parental
psychological control was associated with more
disclosure (and less secrecy) regarding personal issues
and less secrecy regarding peer issues. We assessed
disclosure in terms of how much ‘‘adolescents
usually tell, without parents asking’’ about different
issues. Thus, the findings for psychological control
raise the intriguing possibility that adolescents with
parents who use more psychological control may feel
subtly coerced to disclose personal issues without
parents overtly asking; this issue bears further investigation
in future research. Darling et al. (2004)
have examined different disclosure strategies, including
full disclosure, partial disclosure (e.g.,
omitting some details), lying, and avoidance; future
research should examine whether parental psychological
control is differentially associated with adolescents’
use of these strategies. In addition, in this
study, psychological control was assessed using
parent reports; adolescents’ reports of parenting
were not obtained. As different informants’ ratings
of parenting are typically only moderately correlated
(Pettit, Laird, Bates, Dodge, & Criss, 2001; Smetana &
Daddis, 2002), future research should determine
whether adolescents’ perceptions of parental psychological
control are also associated with greater
disclosure, more secrecy, and use of different disclosure
strategies.
Limitations of this Study and Future Directions
A strength of this study was that we compared
adolescents’ ratings of disclosure to mothers with
mothers’ ratings of their adolescents, yielding a more
precise assessment of parent – child similarities and
differences than is typically obtained when students
are asked to rate ‘‘parents.’’ However, because of the
number of single-parent families in our sample and
the difficulty of enrolling fathers in research (Parke &
Buriel, 1998), we only obtained responses from one
parent per family. In future research, both mothers’
and fathers’ ratings of adolescent disclosure should
be obtained so that interactions between parents’
and adolescents’ gender in disclosure can be more
fully examined.
Owing to the task demands (including the time
needed to complete the surveys and the redundancy
of asking so many questions repeatedly about the
same set of items), we did not obtain adolescents’

214 Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-Barr
parent-differentiated perceptions of beliefs about the
legitimacy of parents’ authority or adolescents’ obligations
to disclose. It would be worthwhile in future
research to determine whether adolescents’
beliefs about these issues differ when considering
mothers and fathers. Likewise, we did not obtain an
assessment of parents’ perceptions of their adolescents’
secrecy, because of task demands as well as
concerns about whether parents know what they do
not know. Future research should examine parents’
knowledge of or perceptions of adolescents’ secrecy.
In this study, we restricted our assessment of
disclosure and secrecy to everyday activities, including
personal, peer, and schoolwork issues. It
would be especially important in future research to
examine disclosure regarding a broader set of issues,
including prudential behaviors (such as drug and
alcohol use, cigarette smoking, and sexual activity)
as well as other domains of misbehavior (such as
cutting classes or bullying). We did not obtain assessments
of disclosure regarding these behaviors
because our piloting indicated the need to differentiate
between adolescents who engage in these behaviors
but do not tell their parents and adolescents
who are not involved in the behaviors (and thus
have nothing to tell). Future research focusing on
normative samples of adolescents will need to disentangle
these issues carefully. Previous research has
shown that parents solicit more information when
their adolescents are more involved in problem behavior
(Kerr & Stattin, 2000; Tilton-Weaver & Galambos,
2003), but it would also be interesting to
examine the correlates of adolescents’ disclosure
over these aspects of adolescents’ behavior. Taking a
different approach, Darling et al. (2004) examined
how much adolescents disclose about issues of conflict.
However, this may provide an incomplete assessment
of disclosure, as there may be little conflict
about issues that are successfully concealed. For instance,
our results indicated that conflict intensity
was related to greater secrecy about peer issues, but
not personal or schoolwork issues.
The correlates examined here accounted for a
sizable proportion of the variance in disclosure, but
much less of the variance in secrecy. Thus, future
research needs to better identify the correlates of
secrecy, especially as Finkenauer et al. (2005) has
found that concealment in their sample had significant
but low associations with different dimensions
of parenting. Whereas disclosure may reflect normative
developmental processes of individuation,
the association between poor self-esteem and greater
secrecy (at least over schoolwork) suggests that secrecy
may have its roots in (mal)adjustment. This
hypothesis should be examined in future research
that includes a broader range of adjustment measures;
this might better illuminate Finkenauer et al.’s
(2002) claim that disclosure and secrecy are distinct.
Longitudinal research is needed to examine the
developmental trajectories and interrelationships
among beliefs about parental authority and adolescents’
obligations to disclose to parents and actual
disclosure. We hypothesize that authority beliefs influence
beliefs about adolescents’ obligation to disclose
to parents, which in turn influence disclosure.
As these constructs were assessed concurrently in
this study, however, the causal directions and mediating
(or potentially moderating) relationships
among the variables cannot be determined.
Disclosure and secrecy should also be examined
in a broader age range of adolescents, and adolescents’
justifications for disclosure or secrecy in different
domains should be investigated. Adolescents
may have different reasons for not disclosing or
concealing issues in the personal versus other domains,
and these reasons may be differentially related
to adjustment. Furthermore, as Darling et al.
(2004) have found, disclosure and secrecy are only
two of several possible strategies adolescents may
have for managing information, and more research
on adolescents’ strategies for managing different
types of issues is needed.
Although our participation rates were good and
our sample appeared to be representative of the
larger school district from which it was drawn, previous
research has indicated that well-functioning
families are overrepresented in family research, especially
when active informed consent procedures
are used (Weinberger, Tublin, Ford, & Feldman,
1990), as was done here. Thus, future research might
include both normative and at-risk youth. Furthermore,
future research should examine disclosure and
secrecy in different ethnic and racial groups, as it is
likely that disclosure and secrecy in adolescent –
parent relationships may have different meanings in
different cultural contexts.
Finally, the results of this study have implications
for the recent debates about parental knowledge and
parental monitoring. It has been claimed (Crouter &
Head, 2002; Kerr & Stattin, 2000) that most measures
of parental monitoring are actually measures of parental
knowledge, which come primarily from adolescent
disclosure in the context of trusting parent –
child relationships. Our results confirm the salience
of trust in adolescent disclosure, but we also found
that, even in good relationships, parents overestimate
their adolescents’ disclosure, particularly at
middle adolescence and with regard to peers. This

suggests the need for further specification and more
precise measurement of ‘‘parental knowledge.’’ For
instance, as our results indicate that parents think
they know more than they do, parent reports of
knowledge may be of limited value. On the other
hand, much research has asked adolescents ‘‘how
much your parents really know’’ about the youth’s
activities. Our findings suggest that it might be better
to more directly assess how much adolescents disclose
to parents, rather than asking adolescents to
estimate how much their parents know. Furthermore,
researchers have not paid sufficient attention
to the types of items used to assess parental monitoring
or knowledge. Future research should distinguish
between issues that adolescents feel obligated
to disclose (like prudential or peer issues) and personal
issues, where disclosure is discretionary, as our
results indicate that there are age-related, conceptual,
and generational differences in the way parents
and adolescents think about these different dimensions
of disclosure and secrecy.
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Appendix A
Table A1
Stimulus Items for Assessments of Authority and Disclosure Beliefs, Actual Disclosure, and Secrecy
Beliefs about legitimate authority and disclosure Actual disclosure and secrecy
Prudential (risk) Prudential (schoolwork)
Drinking alcohol Getting a bad grade/not doing well on work or tests
Smoking cigarettes Finishing homework or assignments
Going to a party where alcohol is served How teens are doing in different school subjects
Using marijuana or other illicit drugs Doing particularly well on an assignment or test
Socially regulated (moral and conventional)
How friends are treated (teasing, saying mean things)
Spreading rumors or saying something cruel
Keeping promises to others (lying or dishonesty)
Talking back or being rude to a teacher in class
Type of language (cursing or swearing)
Disclosure in Adolescence 217
Multifaceted
Websites visited on the Internet
Multifaceted (peer)
Types of movies watched or CDs listened to (watching or listening
to R-rated movies or CDs)
Hanging out at a friend’s when no adult is home
Hanging out with friends parents don’t like Spending time with someone parents don’t like
If or who teens are dating If or who teens are dating
Personal Personal
How teens spend their free time How teens spend their free time
How teens spend their own money How teens spend their own money
What teens talk about on the phone with friends What teens talk about on the phone with friends
What teens write in e-mails, letters, or journals What teens write in e-mails, letters, or journals
Who teens like or have a crush on Who teens like or have a crush on