DOI: 10.4324/9781003195511-28
As a college sophomore, Sam was doing well. They had great grades, a
decent part-time job, close friends, and had been with their romantic partner
for 2 years. However, as the Spring semester was about to start, Sam
discovered their partner was cheating. Heartbroken, Sam told their friends.
Upon telling them, Sam’s friends said they had known about it for months.
As it turns out, Sam’s partner had told Sam’s friends about the infidelity.
Sam’s partner told their friends not to tell Sam. Sam’s friends had kept their
promise, but should they have told Sam sooner?
Jamie had spent much of their time with Quinn in a friends-with-benefits
type of relationship. They were not in an exclusive relationship, but Jamie
did not have other sexual relationships. One day, Jamie felt ill—fever, sore
throat, aching joints—and went to the doctor. After running some tests, the
doctor informed Jamie they have a sexually transmitted disease that is curable
with treatment. After picking up their antibiotic, Jamie confronted Quinn,
expressing their anger at not practicing safe sex with other partners. Quinn
told Jamie they must be crazy because Quinn showed no signs of gonorrhea.
Despite Jamie’s insistence Quinn was their only sexual partner, Quinn
denied any wrongdoing. Two days later, Jamie woke up to around twelve
Twitter notifications. Each Tweet tagged them with phrases such as “Hey @
Jamie: #SharingIsntAlwaysCaring,”“@Jamie #ClapsBack,”and “A round of
applause for @Jamie #ClapClapClap.” Devastated at publicly exposing their
private life, Jamie called Quinn and asked why they told others about their
conversation. Quinn explained this is their health, too, and they have a right
to do with it what they want. Although this may be true, should Quinn have
shared this information with others without telling Jamie?
Sam and Jamie’s stories illustrate the decisions we make about how much
to protect private information, how much to share it with others, and the
consequences occurring with how we manage private information. Different
theoretical frameworks and research findings provide insight into why
we make certain decisions, how we discuss issues with others, and how we
24
Communication Privacy
Management Theory
Significance for Interpersonal Communication
Sandra Petronio
Jeffrey T. Child
Robert D. Hall
S. Petronio et al.Communication Privacy Management Theory
Communication Privacy Management Theory 315
communicate and negotiate privacy boundaries to achieve an optimal balance
between privacy and social relationships. In this chapter, we introduce
communication privacy management (CPM) theory developed by Sandra
Petronio (2002, 2013) as a useful theory for assisting researchers, students,
and practitioners in grasping how individuals and relational others reveal,
conceal, and [mis]manage private information (Petronio & Child, 2020).
In what comes next, we discuss the purpose, principles, and value of CPM.
Intellectual Tradition of Communication Privacy
Management Theory
CPM is a “homegrown” communication theory based on systematic
research, designed to develop an evidence-based understanding of how people
regulate revealing and concealing private information. Although some
theories fit within one methodological paradigm, CPM spans the range of
interpretivist and post-positivist paradigms because CPM was not developed
with a methodological approach in mind. Because an interpretivist’s
research methods capture purposive and socially embedded human action
“to understand the web of meanings in which humans act” (Baxter & Babbie,
2004, p.  59), CPM helps us understand human action, such as the
disclosure of private information, as purposive, rule driven, and interpreted
by those participating in the disclosure event. On the other hand, CPM
also guides post-positivist research such as how different kinds of core and
catalyst privacy rule considerations predict individual privacy management,
collective boundary coordination, and boundary turbulence. According to
Baxter and Babbie (2004), post-positivist researchers attempt to explain,
predict, and control human behavior (see Chapter 1 of this book). As such,
CPM offers principles and perspectives allowing researchers to use different
methodologies.
Main Goals and Features of Communication Privacy
Management Theory
CPM is a rules-based and system-based theory about how individuals, dyads,
and groups of people disclose and protect different kinds of private information.
We unpack each aspect of this definition and make connections to the
axioms and theoretical principles underlying CPM (see Table 24.1).
Defining Private Information and Considering Disclosure Practices
CPM conceptualizes disclosure in different and important ways from previous
theorizing and research. Earlier self-disclosure research focused largely
on depth and breadth of disclosure resulting in deeper development of
intimacy between individuals. In our opening story, we see that Sam and
Jamie discussing their relational issues with friends may have lessened their
316  S. Petronio et al.
Table 24.1  CPM Axioms and Privacy Management Considerations
Axiom Definition Considerations
Axiom 1 People believe they are the sole owners *Privacy Ownership
of their private information, and they
trust they have the right to protect their
information or grant access to it.
Axiom 2 When original owners grant others access *Privacy Ownership
to private information, they become
authorized co-owners and are perceived
by the original owner to have fiduciary
responsibility for the information.
Axiom 3 Because people own rights to their private *Privacy Control
information, they also justifiably feel
they should be the ones controlling their
privacy.
Axiom 4 The way people control the flow of private *Privacy Control
information is through the development *Individual Privacy
and use of privacy rules. These rules Boundary Regulation
are derived from decision criteria such
as motivations, cultural values, and
situational needs.
Axiom 5 Successful and continued control post- *Privacy Control
access is achieved through coordinating *Collective Privacy
and negotiating privacy rules with Boundary Regulation
authorized co-owners regarding third- *Privacy Turbulence
party access.
Axiom 6 Co-ownership leads to jointly held *Privacy Ownership
and operated collective privacy *Privacy Control
boundaries where contributions of *Collective Privacy
private information may be given by all Boundary Regulation
members.
Axiom 7 Collective privacy boundaries are regulated *Privacy Control
through decisions about whom may *Collective Privacy
become privy, how much others inside Boundary Regulation
and outside the collective boundary
may know, and rights to disclose the
information.
Axiom 8 Privacy regulation is often unpredictable *Privacy Turbulence
and can range from disruptions in the
privacy management system to complete
breakdowns.
levels of relational intimacy since the disclosures created tension between
the partners. CPM theory assumes the content of what is disclosed between
individuals is less important than how vulnerable the discussion of content
with others makes someone feel (Petronio, 2002, 2010). It is important to
stress that different people will find revealing certain types of private information
more easy or difficult. Returning to our opening examples, some
couples might be fine with a close group of friends knowing more about
Communication Privacy Management Theory 317
their relationship yet mark other topics as sensitive or off limits to discuss
with others. Given these differences, CPM focuses more on how people
make choices about revealing and concealing information, how others are
involved in that process, and how they control access to information within
privacy boundaries.
Individual and Collective Privacy Boundaries and
Ownership Considerations
CPM uses a boundary metaphor to illustrate the disclosure and management
of private information. Private information not shared with anyone
resides in an individual privacy boundary (Petronio, 2002). People believe
they have the right to make decisions about who gets to know their private
information, how much of it they get to know, and under what considerations
private information might be shared with others (see Axioms 1 and
3, Table 24.1). When individuals share private information with others, it
moves out of an individual privacy boundary into either a dyadic (shared
with one other person) or collective privacy boundary (shared with multiple
others) where the future control of private information becomes a mutual
obligation for everyone who has become a co-owner and knows the private
information (See Axioms 2 and 6). Thus, when Quinn shares Jamie’s health
information with others, this information moves from a dyadic collective
privacy boundary between partners into a collective privacy boundary
including the partner and friendship circle. When more people are included
in a privacy boundary, controlling further management of the private information
within that boundary is more difficult because it requires negotiation
and agreement among the diverse co-owners about what to do with information
in collective privacy boundaries (Petronio, 2013).
Rules-Based Approach to Control the Management of
Private Information
As a rules-based theory (Petronio, 2002, 2013), CPM suggests when people
make decisions about sharing private information with others, different rules
assist in the privacy management process (see Axioms 4, 5, and 7). Privacy
rules allow private information to move from individual boundaries into
collective privacy boundaries. For example, relational partners may have
rules about when to talk to one another about spending practices. Privacy
rules can sometimes be explicit and well understood by others and other
times implicit and assumed. Articulating and coordinating privacy rules for
information residing within collective privacy boundaries allows co-owners
to know the expectations regarding future management of co-owned information
(Petronio & Child, 2020). Assumptions regarding implicit privacy
rules can be inaccurate because they are not talked about directly enough to
give concrete guidance.
318  S. Petronio et al.
How we navigate privacy rules and move information from individual
into collective privacy boundaries is influenced by core and catalyst privacy
rule criteria (Petronio, 2013). Core privacy criteria are usually stable
and predictable influences across time (i.e., gender, culture, privacy orientations).
For instance, young adults in the United States typically do not experience
much boundary readjustment in what they reveal or conceal after
accepting Facebook friend requests whereas the opposite is sometimes the
case in China (Child & Westermann, 2013; Fang & Gong, 2020). In addition
to global culture, we can think about families and other groups as having
a culture that is created and sustained through communication (Petronio,
2002, 2010), making another type of core privacy criterion is how families
create predictable norms concerning privacy expectations, or family privacy
orientations, about sharing of private information within and outside the
family (Serewicz & Canary, 2008).
Catalyst privacy criteria, however, influence private information management
depending upon the situation, people’s motivations to share or
conceal, and/or making assessments about the risks versus rewards related to
sharing or concealing (Petronio, 2013). For example, Wilson et al. (2019)
illustrated some of the catalyst influences faced by female veterans diagnosed
with post-traumatic stress disorder. These women determined whether to
talk about mental health struggles with others out of a fear of being stigmatized
and/or receiving different kinds of social support benefits like when
expressing struggles, which may vary across relationships and time.
People establish different types of rules about whom, when, and what others
can know regarding information shared within and outside a collective
boundary (boundary linkage rules); the quantity and frequency of discussing
information within and outside the collective (boundary permeability
rules); and how to make decisions about further sharing the information
beyond the collective (boundary ownership rules; Petronio & Child, 2020).
When groups come to an agreement about privacy rules, fewer breakdowns
occur in the overall management of private information within the collective
privacy boundary (see Axioms 5 and 7). For example, if Jamie explicitly
told Quinn to not talk about their sexual history with anyone else, Jamie has
specified a type of boundary permeability rule, and private information is
easier to manage when both parties respect the privacy rules.
System-Based Approach to Privacy Management and
Making Readjustments
As a systems-based theory, CPM’s propositions involve coordinating privacy
management expectations with those becoming co-owners of private information
(see Axiom 5) within relational, family, and group systems. Thus,
CPM specifies considerations and processes for both individual and collective
privacy management. The boundary metaphor allows consideration of
boundaries with thin, moderate, or thick boundary permeability (Petronio,
Communication Privacy Management Theory 319
2002; Petronio & Child, 2020). A thick privacy boundary is one through
which little information moves out of the boundary whereas a thin privacy
boundary is more porous, allowing greater breadth and depth of disclosures
to move into other types of collectively owned privacy boundaries.
When people are displeased with the flow of information within different
types of privacy boundaries, they will reflect on their established rules for
controlling the management of private information within privacy boundaries.
Privacy turbulence is when adjustments to privacy rules are needed to
prevent future privacy breakdowns (see Axiom 8). As such, CPM enables
analysis of the functioning of privacy rules and how well the rules prevent
breakdowns from occurring (see Axiom 5). Because CPM involves relational
parties, it has a recalibration process, wherein people make tweaks
and readjustments to rule parameters when small parts or the entire privacy
management system needs readjustments (Petronio, 2002). For instance,
Sam and their partner from our opening example likely need to make several
readjustments to the privacy rules guiding future disclosures, including
telling their friends the type of information they believe should have a thin
boundary and be considered collective information and information that
should have a thick boundary and stay private within the couple boundary.
How Communication Is Conceptualized in Communication
Privacy Management Theory
Unlike earlier perspectives on self-disclosure that focused on the sender’s
perspective, CPM makes the communicative process the central feature, by
considering both the recipient and the discloser. As such, CPM is wholly
a communication theory. Fundamentals of CPM and inquiries regarding its
principles seek an understanding of a communication phenomenon as an
interpersonal communication theory.
Coordinating Privacy Management Expectations With Others
When the discloser(s) and recipient(s) set clear privacy rules and agree to
follow them, interactants can avoid privacy breakdowns (Petronio, 2002).
Often, individuals assume others understand privacy expectations or know
how to manage private information with others without explicit discussions
(Steuber & McLaren, 2015). CPM is a communication theory as boundary
coordination requires interaction about privacy management expectations.
From our opening example, if Jamie would have said, “I’d appreciate you
not talking about our relational problems with anyone but me and your doctor
because it makes me uncomfortable for others to know about our sexual
life,” both Jamie and Quinn would have a clear sense of the expectations of
what information should be kept private and what can be shared with others.
It is important to know that relational parties do not always agree about
privacy rules. Since Jamie is a co-owner of private information with Quinn,
320  S. Petronio et al.
they may have different expectations than Quinn about discussing relational
problems with friends. To keep from experiencing boundary turbulence,
the two must actively coordinate privacy expectations. Quinn may say to
Jamie, “I find it helpful to talk to my friends about our relational problems.”
Such a sentiment conveys that Quinn wants to remove the possibility
of a thick privacy boundary regarding discussing relational problems with
friends. When dyads and groups negotiate and coordinate the acceptable
management of private information, boundary coordination occurs. Quinn
may ask Jamie, “Are there specific relationship problems you don’t want me
to discuss with my friends and other problems that I can talk about?” As
such, boundary coordination involves agreement about appropriate types
of privacy rules interactants are willing and able to follow (Petronio, 2002;
Petronio & Child, 2020). After agreeing, Quinn would need to discuss the
expected rules regarding discussion of relational problems with their friends
or self-regulate information shared with friends going forward.
Achieving a shared understanding regarding private information management
involves communication, compromise, and coordination between
people (Petronio & Child, 2020). Inherent within this discussion of coownership
is also the notion co-owners may not come to a coordinated
understanding about how to manage collectively owned private information.
This sometimes happens because a person’s own privacy expectations
are misaligned with the original owner, which leads us to a discussion
regarding confidants in CPM.
Confidant Types and Considering the Mutual Needs of an Original
Owner and Co-Owners
A confidant is someone trusted by an original owner of private information,
and confidants can be reluctant, inferential, or deliberate. As we have just
seen in the preceding text, an individual may make someone a co-owner of
private information, and that individual may see their expectations differently
from the original owner. For example, a relational party may become
a reluctant confidant when they do not want to know private information
shared with them by another (Petronio, 2002). In such situations, negotiating
and coordinating privacy management expectations with reluctant confidants
can be a complex task. For instance, suppose Quinn told their friends
that having conflict in their romantic relationship frequently makes them
depressed and even suicidal at times. We would not be surprised that Quinn
asks their friends to not talk about this with others. Those friends may not
follow Quinn’s privacy rules if they do not perceive a sense of obligation to
protect the information in the same way. Thus, one of Quinn’s friends may
widen the circle of co-ownership of private information out of a concern
for Quinn’s safety and social support needs as being more important than
Quinn’s expressed privacy expectations (Child & Starcher, 2020). However,
an inferential confidant, which is someone who expects to be told things by
Communication Privacy Management Theory 321
virtue or having some type of a relationship with the discloser, may expect
to hear such sensitive private information from Quinn. Furthermore, one
of Quinn’s friends may have solicited the private information from Quinn,
making this friend a deliberate confidant, which is when someone elicits
information from the discloser (Petronio, 2002). As such, CPM is unique
from other disclosure theories by considering the privacy expectations of
original owners and co-owners and how these preferences may be complementary
or contradictory in nature.
Ramifications of Privacy Boundary Turbulence
Often, due to incongruent expectations or misunderstanding, boundary
turbulence ensues (Petronio, 2002). There are many reasons why turbulence
occurs, such as privacy violations, privacy dilemmas, and misconceptions
about co-ownership. In each case, there are potential negative relational
ramifications when privacy boundaries become turbulent.
If a co-owner intentionally disregards co-ownership rules negotiated
with them, an intentional privacy rule violation and breakdown occurs. If
the original owner of the information suspects there was just a misunderstanding
with the co-owner about privacy rules, they will likely respond
to the situation in a different way than if they believe the rules were
intentionally violated. (Petronio & Child, 2020). In the case of intentional
privacy violations, corrective action may include not sharing private
information with people we perceive cannot be trusted in the future.
In the case of unintentional privacy breakdowns, further discussion and
negotiation may allow the relational parties to return to equilibrium in
terms of managing private information (Steuber & McLaren, 2015). For
example, if Jamie confronts Quinn about the tweets and says, “I thought
we agreed not to talk with our friends about our sex life,” Quinn can
explain their actions. If Quinn says, “I’m sorry. One of my friends was
talking about an argument with their partner, and I forgot our rule and
shared a story of our own—it was unintentional,” such a conversation may
ultimately enable the couple to revisit the privacy rules for collectively
owned private information and make sure each is happy with their understanding
of privacy expectations.
Research and Practical Applications of Communication
Privacy Management Theory
CPM is a dynamic theory useful to understanding disclosure and communication
issues across different types of relationships. For example, interpersonal
communication researchers using CPM have studied (a) interpersonal
health issues, (b) the use of social media, and (c) families. We next highlight
recent CPM-related research themes in each area since the previous iteration
of this chapter.
322  S. Petronio et al.
First, in the interpersonal health communication context, CPM scholars
have studied interaction and privacy negotiation in a wide array of relationships
such as college relationships (Zengaro et al., 2020), family members
and friends (Hall, 2020; Rafferty et  al., 2019), healthcare providers and
patients (Bute et al., 2019), romantic partners (Brannon & Rauscher, 2019),
and workplace relationships (Hall & Miller-Ott, 2019; Smith & Brunner,
2017). These scholars have a focus on the negotiation of CPM’s rule-based
system across relational types.
In one example, Hall (2020) studied the disclosure of mental health information
with friends and found that what is being disclosed is not as important
as how it is being disclosed, concluding that individuals do not always
create explicit boundary linkage rules when sharing health-related information
with their friends (Hall, 2020). In particular, friends often establish
implicit norms and expectations grounded in the friendship to protect
one another from experiencing some of the cultural stigmas about mental
health. In another study, Bute et al. (2019) examined disclosures concerning
how women and men reveal about miscarriage. They describe how different
societal norms enable women to talk about the loss of a baby in different
ways than is the case for men (Bute et al., 2019). Through CPM, we can
also better understand the dilemmas physicians and their families face when
there have been medical errors with patients (Petronio et al., 2013). CPM
has been very valuable for enlightening the role of communication and privacy
rules involved in negotiating various health issues.
Second, privacy regulation practices are an important part of navigating
social media and mediated communication channels, and CPM presents
useful information guiding everyday practices (Petronio & Child, 2020).
Individuals, dyads, and social groups utilize different privacy rules when
deciding what information to share through social media with the interpersonal
and mediated networks with access to that information (De Wolf,
2020). In particular, users of Snapchat (a primarily video-and text-based
application) share private information more freely than do Facebook users
(Hollenbaugh, 2019). Given the diversity of people’s social media networks,
people often anticipate the need to make adjustments over time in how
they manage private information on the platform. Social media users delete
information to appropriately manage impressions, to achieve greater safety
and identity protection needs, to satisfy interpersonal relationships, and to
prevent legal or disciplinary action from occurring (Child et al., 2011; Child
et al., 2012). For example, an underage college student might delete photos
where they have a drink in their hand to prevent getting in trouble.
Third, when we think about privacy management in families, because
mediated communication allows parents to digitally track children better
than before, young adults today can experience a range of privacy breakdowns
with parents through mediated communication channels (Ledbetter,
2019; Ledbetter et al., 2010). For example, perhaps surprisingly, Ledbetter
(2019) found that young adults most frequently report their parents do not
Communication Privacy Management Theory 323
use mediated communication to invade their privacy and they do not need
to defend against parent privacy invasions. This may be because young adults
are the ones teaching older generations of family members about effective
social media privacy management (Child et al., 2015). Child and colleagues
found that young adults spend more time helping parents and grandparents
learn how to interact and manage private information effectively online
whereas they provide more advice about avoiding privacy breakdowns to
their siblings. These findings illustrate the importance of considering how
individuals and relational parties manage private information on social
media when they consider the use of social media to relate and interact with
others.
Interpersonal and family communication researchers also illustrate how
privacy rules adapt and change to fit evolving needs across the life span. Specifically,
recent research on adapting disclosure across the life span reflects
how adult children adjust what they reveal and conceal to an aging parent
(Lillie & Venetis, 2020; Wenzel Egan, 2020), LGBTQIA+ individuals
disclose a sexual minority orientation to family and friends (Pecoraro,
2020), married partners manage private information with in-laws (Young &
DeGroot, 2019), and birth parents seek out a child relinquished through
closed adoption practices (Rizzo Weller & Hosek, 2020). These studies represent
applications of CPM where family members adjust privacy rules to
meet changing and complex situations.
A familial change sometimes triggering privacy management readjustments
is when an adult child moves away to college for the first time. Parents
can respond to this adjustment by invading the privacy of their adult
children or giving their child the space to manage their private information
as desired (Ledbetter, 2019). When parents frequently invade the privacy
of their children at college (and the children do not defend against the privacy
invasions) higher levels of psychological distress are more common for
the adult child. These findings illustrate the importance of maintaining an
adequate balance between both sharing and protecting private information
between family and friends.
Caring for aging parents can also change the type of private information
shared between family caregivers and other members of the family (Lillie &
Venetis, 2020; Wenzel Egan, 2020). When family members become more
involved in the care of aging parents, boundary coordination processes may
adjust (Wenzel Egan, 2020). Some family caregivers experience a gradual
increase in access to a parent’s private information. Some parents entirely
relinquish ownership and control of their private information to the family
caregiver. Some caregivers have a parent who oscillates between sometimes
sharing and other times protecting their private information, where the parent
segments access to some of their private information to different family
members for different reasons. Regardless of the privacy management pattern
(Wenzel Egan, 2020), adult children caregivers who engage in more
topic avoidance with siblings about caregiving for an elderly parent(s) are
324  S. Petronio et al.
less relationally satisfied and more depressed than parental caregivers who do
not avoid talking about the various aspects of a parent’s overall health that
are in flux (Lillie & Venetis, 2020).
Evaluation of Communication Privacy Management Theory
CPM is a valuable theory containing significant strengths. Unlike many
previous theories adopted from other disciplines, CPM represents a theory
explicitly grounded in and derived from the communication discipline.
CPM helps us understand how and why we reveal and conceal private information.
CPM has generated a plethora of research in contexts across disciplines
including computer science, health, psychology, sociology, business,
and government (Petronio & Child, 2020). CPM can be used to understand
privacy and disclosure in contexts such as healthcare, education, social media,
business, economics, and organizations. One criticism of CPM theory is its
lack of parsimony. Because CPM reflects a complex set of rules and considerations
related to understanding disclosure and privacy management systems,
researchers frequently turn to utilize aspects of CPM (e.g., disclosure
criteria, privacy turbulence) in their projects rather than exploring every
tenet of CPM. On the other hand, one of the greatest strengths of CPM
is its utility and heuristic value in both basic and applied research. As such,
researchers seeking to use CPM in their studies will find that CPM works
well within both post-positivist and interpretivist paradigms. However, less
CPM research reflects the critical paradigm by exploring inherent power
differentials within interpersonal relationships and how this may influence
various decisions and outcomes regarding private information disclosure.
Thus, more work is needed in developing measures and exploring various
interpersonal relationships to capture the full complement of ways CPM can
help us understand how people manage private information.
Continuing the Conversation
The directions for future research using CPM are numerous. Balancing privacy
and disclosure is not a task found exclusively in close, personal relationships
and is applicable in groups and organizations as well. For example,
CPM is applicable to address questions about mediated communication and
privacy management practices occurring on mobile phones (i.e., texting,
phone setting use, and partner tracking practices). In the workplace, CPM
can help us understand how co-workers share personal information to be
held in confidence. CPM allows us to better understand what individuals
disclose, what they keep private, and how private information is handled
among people. Future research should continue testing the viability of the
theory across applications and exploring the nuanced understandings and
sense-making processes of private information disclosure. In addition, more
work is needed related to privacy turbulence and repair mechanisms to teach
Communication Privacy Management Theory 325
us how people mend, or choose not to mend, privacy breakdowns. As we
have seen, the heuristic value of CPM is promising, for not only communication
but also many different contexts and disciplines exploring interpersonal
relationships.
References
Baxter, L. A., & Babbie, E. (2004). The basics of communication research. Wadsworth.
Brannon, G. E., & Rauscher, E. A. (2019). Managing face while managing privacy: Factors
that predict young adults’ communication about sexually transmitted infections
with romantic partners. Health Communication, 34(14), 1833–1844. https://doi.org/1
0.1080/10410236.2018.1536951
Bute, J. J., Brann, M., & Hernandez, R. (2019). Exploring societal-level privacy rules for
talking about miscarriage. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 36(2), 379–399.
https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0265407517731828
Child,J.T.,Duck,A.R.,Andrews,L.A.,Butauski,M., &Petronio,S.(2015).Youngadults’
management of privacy on Facebook with multiple generations of family members.
Journal of Family Communication, 15(4), 349–367. https://doi.org/10.1080/15267431.
2015.1076425
Child, J. T., Haridakis, P., & Petronio, S. (2012). Blogging privacy rule orientations,
privacy management, and content deletion practices: The variability of online privacy
management activity at different stages of social media use. Computers and Human
Behavior, 28(5), 1859–1872. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2012.05.004
Child, J. T., Petronio, S., Agyeman-Budu, E. A., & Westermann, D. A. (2011). Blog
scrubbing: Exploring triggers that change privacy rules. Computers in Human Behavior,
27(5), 2017–2027. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2011.05.009
Child, J. T., & Starcher, S. C. (2020). Examining health communication practices and
social support through mediated channels: A communication privacy management
(CPM) theory perspective. In N. Egbert & K. Wright (Eds.), Social support and health
in the digital age (pp. 193–206). Lexington Books.
Child, J. T., & Westermann, D. A. (2013). Let’s be Facebook friends: Exploring parental
Facebook friend requests from a communication privacy management (CPM) perspective.
Journal of Family Communication, 13(1), 46–59. https://doi.org/10.1080/152
67431.2012.742089
De Wolf, R. (2020). Contextualizing how teens manage personal and interpersonal
privacy on social media. New Media & Society, 22(6), 1058–1075. https://doi.org/10.
1177%2F1461444819876570
Fang, S., & Gong, H. (2020). What happens after young adults’ “friending” of parents?
A qualitative study about mediated communication and privacy management
in China. Mobile Media  & Communication, 8(3), 299–317. https://doi.org/10.1177
%2F2050157919879730
Hall, R. D. (2020). Between friends, an “implicit trust”: Exploring the (non)disclosure
of private mental health-related information in friendships. Ohio Communication Journal,
58, 26–39.
Hall, R. D., & Miller-Ott, A. E. (2019). Invisible pain: Women’s (non)disclosure of
fibromyalgia in the workplace. Iowa Journal of Communication, 53(2), 223–251.
Hollenbaugh, E. E. (2019). Privacy management among social media natives: An exploratory
study on Facebook and Snapchat. Social Media + Society, 5(3), 1–14. https://doi.
org/10.1177%2F2056305119855144
326  S. Petronio et al.
Ledbetter, A. M. (2019). Parent-child privacy boundary conflict patterns during the first
year of college: Mediating family communication patterns predicting psychological
distress. Human Communication Research, 45(3), 255–285. https://doi.org/10.1093/
hcr/hqy018
Ledbetter, A. M., Heiss, S., Sibal, K., Lev, E., Battle-Fisher, M., & Shubert, N. (2010).
Parental invasive and children’s defensive behaviors at home and away from college:
Mediated communication and privacy boundary management. Communication Studies,
61(4), 184–204. https://doi.org/10.1080/10510971003603960
Lillie, H., & Venetis, M. K. (2020). Topic avoidance as a privacy management strategy:
Outcomes and predictors of parent well-being and sibling caregiving topic avoidance.
Journal of Family Communication, 20(4), 313–326. https://doi.org/10.1080/15267431
.2020.1823395
Pecoraro, D. (2020). Bridging privacy, face, and heteronormativity: Stories of coming
out. Communication Studies, 71(4), 669–684. https://doi.org/10.1080/10510974.202
0.1776744
Petronio, S. (2002). Boundaries of privacy: Dialectics of disclosure. State University of New
York Press.
Petronio, S. (2010). Communication privacy management theory: What do we know
about family privacy regulation? Journal of Family Theory and Review, 2(3), 175–196.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1756-2589.2010.00052.x
Petronio, S. (2013). Brief status report on communication privacy management theory.
Journal of Family Communication, 13(1), 6–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/15267431.20
13.743426
Petronio, S., & Child, J. T. (2020). Conceptualization and operationalization: Utility of
communication privacy management theory. Current Opinion in Psychology, 31, 76–82.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2019.08.009
Petronio, S., Helft, P. R., & Child, J. T. (2013). A case of error disclosure: A communication
privacy management analysis. Journal of Public Health Research, 2(3), 175–181.
https://doi.org/10.4081%2Fjphr.2013.e30
Rafferty, K. A., Hutton, K., & Heller, S. (2019). “I will communicate with you, but
let me be in control”: Understanding how parents manage private information about
their chronically ill children. Health Communication, 34(1), 100–109. https://doi.org/
10.1080/10410236.2017.1384432
Rizzo Weller, M., & Hosek, A. M. (2020). Birth mothers’ experiences of privacy turbulence
in relation to closed adoption information. Journal of Family Communication,
20(3), 250–264. https://doi.org/10.1080/15267431.2020.1761807
Serewicz, M. C., & Canary, D. J. (2008). Assessments of disclosure from the in-laws:
Links among disclosure topics, family privacy orientations, and relational quality.
Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 25(2), 333–357. https://doi.org/10.1177
%2F0265407507087962
Smith, S. A., & Brunner, S. R. (2017). To reveal or conceal: Using communication privacy
management theory to understand disclosures in the workplace. Management Communication
Quarterly, 31(3), 429–446. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0893318917692896
Steuber, K. R., & McLaren, R. M. (2015). Privacy recalibration in personal relationships:
Rule usage before and after an incident of privacy turbulence. Communication
Quarterly, 63(3), 345–364. https://doi.org/10.1080/01463373.2015.1039717
Wenzel Egan, K. A. (2020). The boundary permeability patterns associated with managing
private information in family eldercare relationships. Qualitative Research Reports in
Communication. https://doi.org/10.1080/17459435.2020.1776758
Communication Privacy Management Theory 327
Wilson, S. R., Hintz, E. A., MacDermid Wadsworth, S. M., Topp, D. B., Southwell,
K. H., & Spoont, M. (2019). Female U.S. military veterans’ (non)disclosure of mental
health issues with family and friends: Privacy rules and boundary management. Health
Communication, 36(4), 412–423. https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2019.1693128
Young, V. J., & DeGroot, J. M. (2019). Topic avoidance as a boundary management
strategy in communication with a mother-in-law. Family Relations, 70(2), 408-421.
https://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12409
Zengaro, E., Carmack, H. J., Buzzelli, N., & Towery, N. A. (2020). Disclosure catalysts
in student disclosures of personal health information to college instructors. Health
Communication. https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2020.1816310