To gossip or not to gossip: Reactions to a perceived request to gossip – A qualitative study

This research primarily aims to evaluate traits exhibited by people when asked to describe in writing a third person to a friend. These traits were classified as positive or negative based on a qualitative analysis conducted on 2230 respondent texts. The request was, in fact, perceived by many participants as a request to gossip, and was opposed with various tacit and explicit rejections. Traits were analyzed and rated by software that was developed specifically for this research. The majority of traits were found to be positive, with ‘good’ the most prominent. This analysis also confirmed that people do not want to be perceived as gossips. They tend to oppose the request to gossip and prefer to use positive trait descriptors.