Journal of Counseling Psychology

1995, Vol. 42, No. 1, 40-46 Copyright 1995 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.
0022-0167/95/S3.00

Self-Concealment and Attitudes Toward Counseling in University Students

Anita E. Kelly and John A. Achter
Iowa State University

In study 1 (N = 257 undergraduates) the relations among self-concealment, attitudes toward

seeking psychological help, and intentions to seek counseling were explored. Results revealed
that even though self-concealment was associated with less favorable attitudes toward
seeking help, it was also associated with greater intentions to seek counseling. In Study 2,
high and low self-concealers (N = 83) read a description of counseling that either (a)
indicated that counseling involves revealing highly personal information or (b) made no
mention of such disclosure. Results revealed that in the former condition, high self-concealers
were less favorable toward counseling than were low self-concealers, whereas in the latter
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condition, there was no significant difference between the two groups. Implications of these
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findings for future research are discussed.

Virtually everyone keeps secrets, or purposely denies
others personal information (Margolis, 1974). Research has
shown that even long-term individual therapy clients keep
secrets from their therapists (Hill, Thompson, Cogar &
Denman, 1993).
Within the psychoanalytic literature, secret keeping has
been viewed as an important component in the development
of ego boundaries and the self-concept (Hoyt, 1978; Tausk,
1933). Moreover, it has been seen as a key to healthy mental
development as persons learn society's taboos and develop
a sense of private individuality (Szajnberg, 1988). However,
this literature has, for the most part, construed secret keep-
ing as pathogenic in nature and as having potentially dis-
ruptive effects on the therapeutic process (e.g., Evans, 1976;
Hoyt, 1978; Saffer, Sansone & Gentry, 1979).
A study conducted by Wright, Ingraham, Chemtob, and
Perez-Arce (1985) supported this notion by demonstrating
that the more group members actively inhibited disclosing
to other group members, the less satisfied they were with the
group therapy sessions. In addition, Regan and Hill (1992)
found a negative relation between the proportion of things
left unsaid in individual counseling sessions and client-rated
satisfaction with change.
Recent research has also supported the idea that secret
keeping per se is pathogenic. A number of correlational and
experimental studies have demonstrated a positive relation
between actively concealing personal information from oth-
ers and a wide variety of psychological and physiological
problems (Ichiyama et al., 1992; Pennebaker, 1985, 1988,
1989; Pennebaker, Barger, & Tiebout, 1989; Pennebaker &
Beall, 1986; Pennebaker, Hughes, & O'Heeron, 1987; Pen-
nebaker, Kiecolt-Glaser, & Glaser, 1988; Pennebaker &
Anita E. Kelly and John A. Achter, Department of Psychology,
Iowa State University.
We thank Fred Borgen, Jeffrey Kahn, and Daniel Russell for
their comments on an earlier version of the article. We also thank
all of our research assistants for their help with this work.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to
Anita E. Kelly, Department of Psychology, University of Notre
Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana 46556.
40
O'Heeron, 1984; Pennebaker & Susman, 1988). Moreover,
case reports have linked secret keeping to various psycho-
logical problems, including psychotic symptoms in children
(Saffer, Sansone, & Gentry, 1979), family dysfunction
(Evans, 1976; Swanson & Biaggio, 1985), and anxiety in
older gays and lesbians (Berger, 1982; Berger & Kelly,
1986).
Given that secret keeping is associated with maladjust-
ment and that it could potentially interfere with the coun-
seling process, secret keeping may be a critical individual
difference variable for counselors to consider when assess-
ing clients. The following are questions that counselors may
consider at intake: Do individuals who keep secrets have
less favorable attitudes toward counseling than those who
readily reveal their secrets? Are individuals who keep se-
crets frightened by the idea that counseling might require
them to reveal their innermost thoughts? If so, what should
be done to attenuate this fear?
We addressed these questions in Studies 1 and 2. These
questions are especially relevant for counselors in light of
Strong's (1968) conceptualization of counseling as a social
influence process. Specifically, Strong (1968) and Strong
and Claiborn (1982) stressed the importance of clients'
believing in the efficacy of the counseling process for it to
be helpful. If clients' initial attitudes about counseling are
negative, then clients might behave in ways that will prevent
them from receiving maximum benefit from the counseling
process.
Study 1
Perhaps individuals who typically keep personal informa-
tion private are actually more likely to seek counseling than
are those who routinely disclose personal information, be-
cause the counseling setting is one place where they can
appropriately and confidentially share their secrets (Tow-
bin, 1978). Research has shown that high self-concealers
tend to have weaker social support networks than do low
self-concealers (Larson & Chastain, 1990). Therefore, high
self-concealers may feel a need to seek counseling to fill
 SELF-CONCEALMENT AND ATTITUDES
this social support void. However, high self-concealers may
remain skeptical about the counseling process because it
does require them to disclose personal information. As such,
we hypothesized that those who scored high on self-con-
cealment would have less favorable attitudes toward seek-
ing psychological help, yet they would be more likely to say
they would seek such help than would low self-concealers.
We also examined how well gender predicted attitudes
toward counseling, because Fischer and Turner (1970)
found women to be more favorable toward seeking pro-
fessional help than men. In addition, because previous re-
search has revealed a strong positive correlation between
self-concealment and depression (Ichiyama et al., 1992;
Larson & Chastain, 1990), we assessed subjects' level of
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depression to be able to control statistically for its effects.
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We hypothesized that self-concealment would be a better
predictor of intentions to seek counseling than would
depression.
Method
Participants. Two hundred sixty students from two introduc-
tory-level psychology courses participated in the study. Virtually
all of those who attended class on the day of the study participated.
Three students did not provide complete data and thus were
dropped from the analyses. The final sample included 186 women
and 70 men, with a mean age of 21.81 years (SD = 4.15). Two
hundred thirty-one students were White, 13 were Black, 8 were
Asian, and 4 were classified as Other. Participants received extra
course credit for their participation.
Measures. The Self-Concealment Scale (SCS) was developed
by Larson and Chastain (1990) to measure the "predisposition to
actively conceal from others personal information that one per-
ceives as distressing or negative" (p. 440). Self-concealment is
related to, but conceptually and empirically distinct from, self-
disclosure (Larson & Chastain, 1990). The SCS was correlated
with self-report measures of anxiety, depression, and physical
symptoms (e.g., headaches and back pain). Importantly, these
relationships remained after controlling for trauma experience and
trauma disclosure (Larson & Chastain, 1990). The 10-item SCS
asks respondents to rate their level of agreement with each state-
ment on a 5-point scale ranging from strongly disagree (1) to
strongly agree (5). The SCS is a reliable measure of self-conceal-
ment, with test-retest (over 4 weeks) and interitem reliability
estimates of .81 and .83, respectively (Larson & Chastain, 1990).
Responses to the 10 items were summed, yielding scores that could
range from 10 to 50, with higher scores indicating greater self-
concealment.
The Intentions to Seek Counseling Inventory is a list of 17 issues
college students commonly bring to counseling. This list was
originally created by Cash, Begley, McCown, and Weise (1975)
and is composed of the following: choosing a major, weight
control, relationship difficulties, self-confidence problems, over-
use of alcohol, personal worries, difficulty in sleeping, concerns
about sexuality, procrastination with schoolwork, difficulty con-
centrating, depression, fear of failure, improvement of self-
understanding, relaxation training, test anxiety, loneliness, and
drug problems (see Robertson & Fitzgerald, 1992). Cash et al.
(1975) found their measure to be sensitive to differential prefer-
ences for attractive and unattractive counselors among college
students. For each issue, participants were asked to rate, on a scale
ranging from very unlikely (1) to very likely (6), how likely they
41
would be to seek help at the university counseling center if they
were experiencing the problem. Their responses were summed to
yield scores ranging from 17 to 102, with higher scores indicating
a greater likelihood of seeking counseling for various problems.
Using our own data, we computed Cronbach's alpha for the 17
items and found it equal to .84.
The 29-item Fischer-Turner Attitudes Toward Seeking Profes-
sional Psychological Help Scale (Fischer & Turner, 1970) assesses
attitudes toward traditional counseling services and asks respon-
dents to rate, on a 4-point scale ranging from agree (0) to disagree
(3), how much they agree with each item. This instrument has
good test-retest reliability, with estimates of .86 (over 5 days)
and .84 (over 2 months); internal consistency estimates range
from .83 to .86. In addition, the Fischer-Turner scale has been
found to be only weakly correlated with social desirability (rs
ranged from - . 1 1 to .20) and negatively correlated with authori-
tarianism and external locus of control. The Fischer-Turner
scale has also been found to discriminate between participants
who have sought psychological assistance and those who have
not (Fischer & Turner, 1970). Participants' responses were
summed to yield scores ranging from 0 to 87, with higher
scores indicating more positive attitudes toward seeking profes-
sional psychological help.
The 24-item Social Provisions Scale (SPS) was developed by
Cutrona and Russell (1987) to assess respondents' perceptions of
the strength of their social support system. Respondents rate their
level of agreement with each of the items on a Likert-type scale
ranging from strongly disagree (1) to strongly agree (4). Test-
retest reliability estimates for the SPS have ranged from .84 to .92,
and interitem correlation coefficients have ranged from .85 to .92.
In addition, the SPS has been found to correlate significantly with
actual interactional behaviors and with other self-report measures
of social support (Cutrona & Russell, 1987). Although the SPS has
six subscales that assess six different types of social support (e.g.,
reassurance of worth), previous analyses of the factor structure of
the SPS have indicated the existence of a strong second-order
factor representing a global measure of social support. This overall
factor was found to account for 92% of the association among the
first-order factors corresponding to the six subscales (see Russell
& Cutrona, 1991). As such, we used the overall scale as an
aggregate measure of social support. Participants' responses were
summed to yield a score ranging from 24 to 96, with higher scores
denoting stronger social support.
The Beck Depression Inventory (BDI; Beck & Steer, 1987) is
composed of 21 items that assess the presence and severity of
depressive symptoms. The items tap cognitions, behaviors, affect,
interpersonal symptoms, and somatic complaints. Each item rep-
resents a symptom of depression, and respondents rate on a 4-point
scale (from 0 to 3) how severe each symptom is for them. The BDI
has acceptable levels of reliability and validity (Cole & Milestead,
1989).
Procedure. Two male experimenters (psychology graduate
students) entered the class during its normal meeting time and
were introduced by the instructor, who then left the room. The
experimenters read a brief introduction to the research project and
asked participants to sign an informed consent form. The experi-
menters then distributed the questionnaire packets consisting of the
Intentions to Seek Counseling Inventory, the SCS, the Fischer-
Turner scale, the SPS, and the BDI. The BDI was presented last in
the packets because of the concern that it could elicit a depressed
mood from some participants and affect their responses to the
other, more central dependent measures.
In reading the instructions, the experimenters stressed the vol-
untary nature of the study and asked participants not to place their
 42 ANITA E. KELLY AND JOHN A. ACHTER
names on the questionnaires. The participants took about 30 min to
complete the questionnaires. When the participants were finished,
they were told about the purpose of the study and given the
opportunity to ask questions.
Results
Descriptive data. Table 1 contains the means, standard
deviations, and zero-order correlations among the variables
included in the multiple regression analysis. Male students
received a score of 1 and female students received a score of
2 for the purposes of the analyses. Mean SCS scores for
women (26.69) and men (25.31) in this sample were not
significantly different (p > .10).
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Fischer-Turner scores. Estimates of how well the SCS,
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SPS, and BDI scores and participants' gender predicted
scores on the Fischer-Turner scale were generated with a
multiple regression analysis. Together, these four predictors
accounted for 14% of the variance on the Fischer-Turner
measure. A significant unique predictive effect was ob-
tained for scores on the SCS, standardized fi = -.32,
f(251) = -4.58,p < .0001. Participants who were higher in
self-concealment tended to have less favorable attitudes
toward seeking professional help than did those lower in
self-concealment. In addition, a significant predictive effect
was revealed for gender, standardized /3 = .23, f(251) =
3.93, p < .0001. Male participants tended to have less
favorable attitudes toward seeking help than did female
participants. There were no significant effects for BDI and
SPS scores (ps > .05).
Intentions to seek counseling. We next assessed how
well all five of these variables predicted scores on the
Intentions to Seek Counseling Inventory using an additional
multiple regression analysis. Results revealed that these five
predictors accounted for 20% of the variance on the inten-
tions measure. Significant predictive effects were found
only for Fischer-Turner scores, standardized j3 = .40,
?(250) = 6.60, p < .0001, and for SCS scores, standardized
j3 = .22, ?(250) = 3.04, p < .003. Although Fischer-Turner
scores and SCS scores were negatively correlated with each
other, both were positively associated with intentions to
seek counseling.
Discussion
As hypothesized, participants who scored higher in self-
concealment rated themselves as being more likely to seek
Table 1
Study 1: Intercorrelations, Means, and Standard Deviations
Variable 1 2 3 4
1. Intentions to
seek counseling — .14* .18*
2. Self-concealment .50*
3. Depression — -.47*
4. Social support
5. Gender
6. Attitudes toward
seeking help
1
p < .05.
counseling for various problems than did participants who
scored lower in self-concealment. This relationship existed
even though high self-concealers had less favorable atti-
tudes toward counseling than did low self-concealers. We
had predicted that high self-concealers would have weaker
social support and, therefore, would report a greater likeli-
hood of seeking counseling. However, results showed that
although social support was highly correlated with self-
concealment (r = —.45), it was not a significant predictor of
intentions to seek counseling. Our results also showed that
depression did not significantly predict intentions to seek
counseling. Thus, self-concealment was a better predictor of
intentions to seek counseling than was either social support
or depression.
Our findings indicate that high self-concealers represent
an enigmatic group of individuals: They are more likely to
seek counseling, but they are less likely to view the coun-
seling process favorably than are low self-concealers. Given
these findings, more research is needed to understand why
high self-concealers have more negative attitudes toward
counseling. One possible explanation is that these individ-
uals fear that counseling will require them to reveal their
innermost thoughts.
Study 2
We described the counseling process to high and low
self-concealers in two ways: One description of counseling
emphasized the importance of disclosing very personal in-
formation to the counselor, whereas the other description of
counseling made no mention of such disclosure. By manip-
ulating the way counseling was presented to participants, we
expected to influence their attitudes toward counseling.
Other researchers have used a similar methodology to in-
fluence participants' perceptions of counseling and their
willingness to see a counselor (e.g., Epperson & Lewis,
1987; Lewis, Davis, & Lesmeister, 1983).
We hypothesized that there would be a significant inter-
action between level of self-concealment and type of coun-
seling description for attitudes toward counseling. Specifi-
cally, we predicted that although high self-concealers would
rate counseling less favorably than would low self-conceal-
ers in both counseling description conditions, the gap be-
tween their ratings would be significantly greater in the
high-disclosure, as compared with the no-mention-of-dis-
closure, condition.
5 6 M SD
-.05 .16* .36* 46.04 17.11
-.45* .07 -.27* 26.28 8.97
.06 -.05 8.10 7.47
— .06 .16* 83.79 9.39
— .22* 1.73 0.45
— 54.60 13.42
 SELF-CONCEALMENT AND ATTITUDES
We also asked participants if they had ever seen a coun-
selor before to assess whether high and low self-concealers
differed in their level of exposure to counseling. Given that
high self-concealers reported greater intentions to seek
counseling in Study 1, we predicted that more of the high
self-concealers, as compared with the low self-concealers,
would report having seen a counselor.
Finally, because of the relatively small number of men in
this sample, we were unable to assess the effects of gender
on attitudes toward counseling for Study 2.
Method
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Participants. One hundred sixty-seven students (119 women
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and 48 men) from an introductory-level psychology course partic-
ipated in the study. Virtually all of those who attended class on the
day of the study participated. Only those who scored in the top and
bottom quarters for this sample on the SCS (i.e., scored 35 or
higher or scored 21 or lower, respectively) were included in the
analyses. This final sample was composed of 61 women and 22
men, with a mean age of 22.54 years (SD = 4.72). Seventy seven
students were White, 4 were Black, and 1 was Asian (1 student did
not indicate race). They received extra course credit for their
participation.
Measures. Participants were asked to rate on a 9-point scale,
ranging from not at all (1) to a great deal (9), "How much does
counseling require the client to disclose highly personal informa-
tion to the counselor?" This manipulation check was included to
assess the effectiveness of the disclosure manipulation.
We used a thought-listing task adapted from the procedures
outlined by Cacioppo and Petty (1981) to assess participants'
favorability toward counseling. Participants were asked to list five
thoughts that occurred to them as they had read the counseling
descriptions. Later, two independent judges coded the valence of
the thoughts, rating them a 0 if they were negative, a 1 if they were
neutral/irrelevant, or a 2 if they were positive toward counseling.
We used the average ratings for participants' first three thoughts in
the primary analyses, because many of the participants listed only
three thoughts. The intraclass correlation between judges' ratings
was .66; thus, we averaged the two judges' ratings for the primary
analyses. Possible scores for each participant ranged from 0 to 2.
At the end of the survey, participants were asked, "Have you
ever seen a counselor for either family, group, or individual
counseling?" Participants answered yes or no to this item.
Procedure. John A. Achter read a brief introduction to the
research project and asked participants to sign an informed consent
form. Achter then distributed the questionnaire packets consisting
of the Intentions to Seek Counseling Inventory, the SCS, the
Fischer-Turner scale, the thought-listing task, and the manipula-
tion check. In addition, each packet contained a description of
counseling that either emphasized the importance of revealing
personal information to the counselor (Description A) or that made
no mention of revealing such information (Description B). The
descriptions were derived from the traditional counseling descrip-
tion used by Epperson and Lewis (1987). Descriptions A and B
were identical in length and only differed in their second and third
sentences. For Description B, these two sentences merely repeated
information that was presented later in the description. The de-
scriptions began as follows:
Description A. Counseling is designed to help you with your
problems. In order to help you, your counselor will need to
know your innermost thoughts and feelings. It is very impor-
43
tant that you share highly personal information with the coun-
selor—information that you might not normally share with
anyone else.
Description B. Counseling is designed to help you with
your problems. In order to help you, your counselor will use
whatever methods and techniques s/he feels are best suited to
your needs. It is important that you share with the counselor
your thoughts about what you want to achieve through
counseling.
Both descriptions ended with identical paragraphs that provided a
general summary of the roles of the counselor and the client in
therapy sessions.
The two versions of the counseling description were randomly
distributed to students. The SCS and the manipulation were coun-
terbalanced so that half the subjects completed the SCS before they
read the manipulation, and half completed it after they read the
manipulation.
In reading the instructions, Achter emphasized the voluntary
nature of the study and asked participants not to place their names
on the questionnaires. The students then read instructions that
indicated that they were going to be asked about their views of the
counseling process. They were told that because a number of them
had not seen a counselor before, a brief description of counseling
was being provided to them. They were asked to read the para-
graphs carefully.
The participants took about 35 min to complete the question-
naires. When the participants finished, they were told about the
purpose of the study and given the opportunity to ask questions.
Results
Counseling exposure. Fifty-seven percent of the high
self-concealers reported having seen a counselor, whereas
only 37% of the low self-concealers reported having seen a
counselor. A chi-square analysis showed that this difference
was significant (in the predicted direction) at the .10 alpha
level, **(1, N= 83) = 3.52, p = .06, thus supporting the
idea that high self-concealers are more likely to seek coun-
seling than are low self-concealers.
Manipulation check. A 2 (level of self-concealment) X
2 (type of counseling description) between-subjects analysis
of variance (ANOVA) was performed on the item, "How
much does counseling require the client to disclose highly
personal information to the counselor?" Results revealed a
main effect for type of counseling description, F(l, 79) =
4.77, p = .03. As expected, participants who read the high-
disclosure description indicated that counseling required
them to disclose more personal information (M = 7.64, on
a 9-point scale) than did participants who read the no-
mention-of-disclosure description (M = 6.77). This finding
supported the effectiveness of the counseling description
manipulation.
Fischer-Turner scores. A 2 (level of self-conceal-
ment) X 2 (type of counseling description) between-sub-
jects ANOVA on the Fischer-Turner scores revealed a
predicted two-way interaction that was significant at the .10
alpha level, F(l, 79) = 3.22, p = .08. Planned comparisons
showed that, among those who read the high-disclosure
description, high self-concealers were less favorable toward
counseling than were low self-concealers F(l, 79) = 10.09,
 44 ANITA E. KELLY AND JOHN A. ACHTER
p = .002. In contrast, among those who read the no-men-
tion-of-disclosure description, there was no significant dif-
ference between high and low self-concealers' favorability
toward counseling (p > .10, see Table 2 for means and
standard deviations). In addition to the two-way interaction,
results revealed a significant main effect for level of self-
concealment, F(l, 79) = 7.72, p = .007. As expected, low
self-concealers were more favorable toward counseling
(M = 57.73) than were high self-concealers (M = 49.38)
across type of counseling description.
Thought-listing responses. A 2 (level of self-conceal-
ment) X 2 (type of counseling description) between-sub-
jects ANOVA on judges' ratings of the favorability toward
counseling of participants' thought-listing responses re-
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vealed a significant interaction between level of self-con-
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cealment and type of description, F(l, 75) = 4.51, p = .04.
Planned comparisons showed that among those who read
the high-disclosure description, high self-concealers were
less favorable toward counseling than were low self-con-
cealers, F(l, 75) = 5.56, p = .02. In contrast, among those
who read the no-mention-of-disclosure description, high
and low self-concealers did not significantly differ in their
favorability toward counseling (p > .10; see Table 2 for
means and standard deviations).
Intentions to seek counseling. A 2 (level of self-conceal-
ment) X 2 (type of counseling description) between-sub-
jects ANOVA on the Intentions to Seek Counseling Inven-
tory scores revealed no significant two-way interaction, p >
.10. In addition, the analysis revealed no significant main
effects, ps > .10.
Content analyses. Content categories for the partici-
pants' responses to the thought-listing task were created in
the following manner: Anita E. Kelly and a counseling
psychology graduate student independently read samples of
participants' responses and then generated 19 initial cate-
gories through discussion. John A. Achter condensed those
19 categories to 11 categories. These final categories were
mutually exclusive, and each participant could have listed
thoughts that fit into a maximum of five categories.
Anita E. Kelly and a counseling psychology graduate
study independently coded the types of thoughts partici-
Table 2
Study 2: Means and Standard Deviations for Fischer-Turner Scores, Thought-Listing
Scores, and Intentions to Seek Counseling
High
Counseling
description n M
High disclosure 20
Fischer-Turner 45.60
Thought-Listing 0.72
Intentions 48.00
No mention of
disclosure 22
Fischer—Turner 52.82
Thought-Listing 1.06
Intentions 49.55
Note. Higher scores denote more favorable responses.
pants listed. Both judges were unaware of participants' (a)
own ratings of the valence of their thoughts and (b) level of
self-concealment. Cohen's kappa on their ratings was .78,
and any discrepancies between the two judges' ratings were
resolved by Anita E. Kelly. The number of high and low
self-concealers who listed thoughts in each of the 11 cate-
gories is presented in Table 3. We conducted comparison of
proportions tests between high and low self-concealers for
each category and found a significant difference between
the two groups only for the category "listed lack of self-
knowledge," z = 2.24, p < .05. More of the high self-
concealers, as compared with the low self-concealers, listed
thoughts that fell into this category.
General Discussion
Together, the findings from Studies 1 and 2 indicate that
high self-concealers had less favorable attitudes toward
counseling than did low self-concealers. However, the find-
ings from Study 1 also showed that high self-concealers
reported being more likely to seek counseling than did low
self-concealers. In addition, Study 2 showed that more of
the high self-concealers, as compared with the low self-
concealers, reported having seen a counselor for family,
group, or individual counseling.
Study 2 provided insight into why high self-concealers
may be less favorable toward counseling. It demonstrated
that high self-concealers who read a description of counsel-
ing that emphasized the importance of client disclosure
were much less favorable toward counseling than were low
self-concealers who read the same description. However,
high self-concealers and low self-concealers who read a
counseling description that deemphasized client disclosure
did not differ in their favorability toward counseling. This
result supports our hypothesis that one reason high self-
concealers are more negative toward counseling than are
low self-concealers is that they fear that counseling will
require them to reveal highly personal information.
Self-concealment
Low
SD n M SD
20
16.06 59.70 13.57
0.51 1.12 0.58
15.28 54.95 19.82
21
14.20 55.86 12.11
0.60 0.95 0.43
13.97 45.19 14.71
 SELF-CONCEALMENT AND ATTITUDES 45

Table 3
Study 2: Number of High and Low Self-Concealers Who Listed Thoughts
in the 11 Categories
High self- Low self-
concealers concealers
Category (n = 41) (n = 38)
1. Expressed fears or concerns about the counseling process 26 19
2. Questioned helpfulness of counseling or credibility of
counselors 24 18
3. Listed lack of self-knowledge 16 5
4. Listed previous counseling experience or current desire
for counseling 12 8
5. Stated having no need or no time for counseling 5 2
6. Mentioned others' experiences in counseling 2 1
7. Listed benefits of counseling 10 12
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8. Described personal problems or personality

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characteristics 6 9
9. Listed thoughts of being counselors themselves 5 6
10. Commented on counselor's understanding, interest, or
style 5 6
11. Commented on the costs of counseling 3 5
' p < .05.

Limitations of This Research
A central limitation of these studies was that we used
self-report measures that are subject to the response sets of
individuals completing the forms. Although our behavioral
intention measure is likely to be a good predictor of actual
behavior (see Fishbein & Azjen, 1975), future researchers
should include assessments of actual client behaviors. Fu-
ture researchers should also attempt to replicate the
present findings with samples of students from other uni-
versities and include samples of individuals from a vari-
ety of cultural backgrounds. Because the participants in
the present samples were primarily White, we were un-
able to assess the potential interaction between clients'
cultural backgrounds and their levels of self-concealment
on perceptions of counseling.
on the counseling process or outcome. The following ques-
tions are of interest in this area: Do high self-concealers
behave as more resistant clients and talk less than other
clients? Do high self-concealers tend to place most of the
treatment responsibility on the counselor and expect the
counselor to do most of the talking? Do high self-concealers
elicit frustration or perhaps high activity levels from the
counselor? These questions could be addressed in a natu-
ralistic setting involving clients who are prescreened for
their tendency to self-conceal (using the SCS) and are
assigned to counselors who remain unaware of clients' level
of self-concealment. Such a study would provide insight
into the role of self-concealment in the counseling process.
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Directions for Future Research
Given our finding that high self-concealers are more
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whether high self-concealers seek counseling more fre-
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premature termination rate in counseling than do low self-
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Received July 8, 1993
Revision received February 7, 1994
Accepted February 8, 1994 •