If I Share With You,Will You Share With Me? A Quasi-Experimental Study on Social Anxiety and Self-Disclosure in Dictator Game

Social anxiety is characterized by a constant fear of negative evaluation, falling short of standards, low perceived likeability, and difficulties meeting social criteria. Using a quasi-experiment and a zero-acquaintance paradigm, this paper examines sharing behavior, which is represented by the willingness to give money in a Dictator Game. It explores gender and social anxiety differences related to this behavior, in terms of who is prone to receive more money. In addition to this, we investigated how the receiver’s self-disclosure (positive or negative) influences the dictators’ sharing behavior. Based on the original version of Dictator Game, involving a dictator and a receiver, one hundred and five adolescents aged 12–15, played Dictator Game in which they divided coins between themselves and the receiver. Our findings indicate that self-disclosure led to positive and gradual changes for non-anxious speakers. The anxious boy consistently achieved the highest money rate among all speakers, while the anxious girl received the lowest. However, her self-disclosure resulted in an increase in receiving. Across all situations, respondents reported slightly increased feelings of guilt and shame. Taken together, this study sheds light on adolescents’ giving behavior by examining the interaction between adolescents’ social traits and diverse social contexts throughout their developmental stages, ultimately influencing prosocial decision-making.