ABSTRACT
In today’s world, families deal persistently with questions about private information. Parents face the task of telling children about genetic diseases discovered in their family, and adult children are often afraid to tell their parents about their HIV status. When a family member is struggling to manage a stigmatized illness, families often must judge whether to guard that information or reveal it to outsiders. Both keeping and telling may be either beneficial or detrimental to the family member or others in the family. Just like managing privacy with outsiders, within families there are judgments members make about how much to share or keep private from other family members. Dealing with privacy in families, although complex, is critically important.
