[Poll] How bad are your worst secrets, really?

There are no magical girls today.

For today's poll, I was thinking about how a respondent in a previous poll about sharing your body with a supernatural blob said that they had horrible secrets that should never be shared with anyone:

Consequently, I ended up rather curious about how bad are everyone's secrets... really?

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I did some googling into this, and apparently there was a bunch of researchers who once asked 13,000 people to tell them their secrets. The psychologists managed to classify most of the secrets into 38 different categories, which I've further digested into ~30 options for the sake of this poll.

Here are my questions for NUF:

1. Which item on the poll is the WORST secret that you have?

2. How many different kinds of secrets do you have, according to the categories on the poll? Note: According to the original research study, most people had 13 out of 38 types of secrets -- five of which were ones they had never told anybody about.

3. What would happen if people found out about your secrets publicly? Would you get disowned by your parents? Arrested? Lynched by a mob...? Or just embarrassment?

4. Are you willing to share your secret with NUF for research™ purposes?​

 

What if the worst secret you hold is something that you didn’t do but promised to keep quiet about it for a friend (for life)?

 

I didn't think of that!

Or well, I guess the original researchers must have focused only on things that the questioned person experienced themselves!

 

Its bad enough that i'll maybe mobbed by my brothers. But not bad enough to get into jail.

 

It’s interesting because some of these things aren’t actually secrets for me. Maybe I don’t tell everyone I come across, but the people important to me know.

I’m going to have to read this over a few times to decide.

 

my fetish

 

1. Doing something illegal ofc.
2. At least three ? I have little use of public standing so the matter that involve lost of honor in public doesn't really bother me. That said i still won't wear ahegao hoodie. And i hate lying to the point that i can't say something comforting to their family if someone died from something stupid such as smoking.
3. Oh my live would be literally over.
4. Sure. Working with irregular forces in foreign lands to terrorize peoples. Profiting off from arms ratlines that certain government made in middle east.

 

I guess I should answer my own questions, right? ...Maybe to get some blood moving?

I counted twelve items that I've kept as a secret to more than a few people.

There is really only one that I've never told anyone about before, but that's only because sexual preferences are not something I'm in a habit of sharing.

I think I would just be really embarrassed. None of them are so horrible that I think anyone would really find it that strange. If anything, it might even be common -- but I'm still not sharing!!

In either case, since mine aren't that bad, I was kind of curious that some people have really big ones to the point that they wouldn't want a divine being living in their head.

I mean, I like my privacy, but do some people have really bad ones?

 

There really isn’t something on here that I’ve experienced that I haven’t told at least one person at some point. I still picked one, but it’s a secret.

 

Hey @lychee want to know a secret

Spoiler: Click here

It is not NUF for research™ purposes but lychee ™ purposes

 

Yeah, that makes sense.

Hmm...I guess in my case it would more about hiding likes/dislikes in general than actual dangerous things. But people around me irl would know about it since I don’t really hide it well even from coworkers...Nothing remotely illegal that would result in trouble as that would affect my ability to obtain visas. Eeeeh...I guess my real secret is that I’m a very boring person... ... ...

 

I am a Chinese mc in the making. Yes, I want to kill everyone.

 

This. Does it count as a secret if you don't want to tell it to certain people but ok with (and have already told it to) somebody else?

 

How bad? Well, bad enough I wouldn't tell just about anyone else about them!

 

Hmm.. Mine's something illegal I've done.
If that secret of mine got out in some way, I would definitely go to jail.

I was in a really tight spot when that happened, & instead of solving it the right way, which is the harder & much more time consuming way. I chose to solve it by doing something illegal.

I've never ever told anyone about it. My parents, my closest friends, lover etc knows absolutely nothing it even though a decade had passed. I wasn't caught so I'm the only one who knows I've done something as scummy as my secret.

 

I think the original research study had a questionnaire like this:

For the above (Part 1), response options (presented in the following order):
1. I have had this experience, and keep it secret from everyone
2. I have had this experience, and keep it secret from some people
3. I have had this experience, and once kept it a secret, but it is not a secret anymore
4. I have had this experience, but I have never kept it a secret
5. I have never had this experience
​

Consequently, I think they considered it a secret even if it was only a secret to some people.

For people who were curious, here was the original questionnaire that I adapted:

 

Traumatic experience.

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Certain people's perception of me would change, I guess.

Only in a private pm!

 

Some figures from the original paper for the curious-minded!

This figure indicates that the most common secrets were lies, sexual behavior, extra-relational thoughts, etc.





This figure indicates that people who had mental health issues, habit/addiction, finances, work discontent, physical discontent, sexual orientation secrets were most likely to spend more time dwelling and thinking about their secrets.

I think it's really interesting that some people keep their mental health issues heavily concealed.

 

The last two options (proposal & surprise) really stand out~