Stigmatization and self-compassion: role in affective and cognitive self-disclosure in support-seeking during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

During the COVID-19 pandemic, residents of Hubei Province, China, the outbreak’s epicenter, faced intense stigmatization that discouraged help-seeking through self-disclosure. This study examined how self-compassion strategies shaped affective and cognitive self-disclosure among stigmatized individuals. We investigated whether self-kindness and mindfulness regulation mediated the relationship between perceived stigmatization and these two types of self-disclosure. A sample of 512 Hubei participants was analyzed using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) and structural equation modeling (SEM). Results showed that higher perceived stigmatization was positively associated with both self-kindness regulation and mindfulness regulation. However, stigmatization directly reduced affective self-disclosure while having no significant effect on cognitive self-disclosure. Despite their positive correlation, self-kindness and mindfulness regulation had opposing effects on affective self-disclosure: self-kindness promoted it, whereas mindfulness suppressed it. These findings emphasize the vulnerability of affective self-disclosure in stigmatized contexts and highlight the critical importance of distinguishing between different self-compassion strategies when designing psychological interventions.