The Harmful Effects of Parasocial Relationships

Parasocial relationships is a term created to refer to a kind of psychological relationship experienced by an audience in their mediated encounters with performers in the mass media, particularly on television (May 2017). The term was coined by Horton and Wohl and have been around since 1956, and viewers or listeners come to feel and consider media personalities almost as friends (May 2017). Humans have a need for social interactions. Interestingly, when the need to belong is unmet, people seek to fulfill this drive through “relationships” with their favorite TV personalities.

Although people understand that these affiliations are one-sided, they nonetheless feel a sense of connection to their onscreen friends (Leder-Elder 2014). Parasocial relationship are the ongoing, one-sided bond with a media figure whereas parasocial interactions are imagined interaction with a media figure during a discrete viewing situation (Vinney 2018). These two concepts are related, but different. When a media consumer feels like they are interacting with a media figure, whether it be a celebrity, fictional character, radio host, or even a puppet, during a discrete viewing or listening scenario, they are experiencing a parasocial interaction (Vinney 2018).

One of the major problems with these one-sided relationships are there connections with loneliness. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, loneliness has been defined as resulting from an individual’s perceived discrepancy between two factors, the desired level and the achieved level of social contact. This feeling has affected small children all the way up to our grandparents. Although parasocial relationships can be fun in the moment, and help celebrities endorse products, and helps major brands get the word out about what they are doing in quicker ways, loneliness is a growing problem among younger generations.

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Children are having a harder time coping with losses after a show or movie they love comes to an end because they don’t get to see their beloved “friends” anymore (Dodds 2015). Everyone experiences parasocial relationships to some degree, therefore making this a topic that is imperative to understand and be aware of. Parasocial relations may be governed by little or no sense of obligation, effort, or responsibility on the part of the spectator. He or she is free to withdraw at any moment. However, if he or she remains involved, these parasocial relations provide a framework within which much may be added by fantasy (May 2017). Review of Literature Although Horton and Wohl implied that parasocial interaction exists only for the duration of the viewing experience, other researchers extended the concept and identified components of parasocial interaction in entertainment programming.

These include interaction, identification, and long-term identification with television characters viewers who have watched a persona consistently over time may perceive a sense of intimacy evolving from their expectations of increased intimacy in past interpersonal experiences (Rubin 1985). Studies of loneliness have demonstrated the limitations of linking a need for interaction solely with social participation. People who consider themselves lonely have been found to attend a greater number of social meetings than less lonely persons (Rubin 1985). Although positive relationships have been reported between loneliness and time spent alone, they were unable to find that the presence of a social network and number of casual friends were associated with loneliness or solitary time.

Research has indicated that loneliness is primarily an internal psychological state (Rubin 1985). The role of dependency in the development of parasocial interaction becomes apparent when the media are used by lonely people. Although motivated to seek social contact, lonely people might be predisposed by their psychological state to be less successful in establishing satisfying interpersonal relationships. This would motivate a person to try to satisfy social interaction needs via mass media use (Rubin 1985). These studies also found no real parasocial relationships being formed with news anchors. Those relationships were saved for beloved fictional characters or the actors who played them.

The information factor that was associated with local television news viewing in this study included notions of seeking to learn and using the information in conversations with others (Rubin 1985). Not only do these components reflect a more instrumental use of local television news, but also that such viewers have the social contacts for such interaction. Based on the loneliness research discussed earlier, it is unlikely that such persons would see themselves as being lonely. Media Dependency: Every day, tens of thousands of vloggers look into their camera lenses and muster a familiar phrase: 'Hey, what's up guys?' This is more than a simple start to a video. They're putting on a friendly face, saying hello, initiating a hangout. It follows that for every successful internet personality there are thousands of people who feel like they know them (Olson 2018).

Perceived reality factors seem to be important to the development of dependency, for if a person does not believe the content of what he or she consumes, media use should have less impact than using content perceived as being more believable. Perceived reality factors appear to be important in the development of parasocial interaction, where the persona tries to simulate the appearance of intimacy (Horton & Wohl, 1956). A healthy dose of media literacy is important for people to keep themselves from overdoing it with their parasocial relationships. Understanding that celebrities are trying to make you like them and act relatable, may not be who they truly are.

Therefore, the two of you may not actually get along all that well. It's important to recognize the influence that their relationships are having on them and if they start to model their lives after a not-so-great role model they need to be able to see this to combat potentially harmful effects. Dangers: Younger kids and teens, particularly girls, are the most vulnerable (Comback 2015). Many younger girls are self-professed “fan-girls” of at least one band or actor and will do just about anything to meet their celebrity crushes. Also, younger people have a harder time discerning who is a good role model or not, so they may start to act like a less than desirable celebrity, etc (Comstock 2015).

In a study done by Susan Boon and Christina Lomore of the University of Calgary, 90 percent of the young adults surveyed said they felt a strong attraction to a celebrity at some point in their lives, while another 75 percent said they felt attachments to more than one celeb (Fellizar 2015). With social media and the works, interactions with celebrities are so much easier. We see updates from Kim Kardashian and our real life friends all on the same news feed, the lines between which relationships are real and which aren’t become blurred (Fellizar 2015).

Brian Spitzberg, a professor at San Diego State University’s School of Communication said, “We aren’t just dropping a text to our friend, but to our famous friend. This phantom reciprocity may be one of the reinforcing aspects of the sequential and ongoing process of receiving messages from the celebrity, which despite going to thousands, can feel uniquely responding to that fan’s devotion.” If people feel like they can easily communicate with celebrities, they start to feel like the celebrity is truly invested in them (Fellizar 2015).

After all, how many times has Taylor Swift treated her fans to hang out at her house or fork some money over to pay for someone’s student loans? But the very bottom line realty is, social media has just played a role in intensifying the parasocial relationships we have with these celebrity crushes. It’s not healthy (Fellizar 2015). They, those holding the one-sided relationships, expect to be noticed. They expect to receive some kind of love and acknowledgement back for all the time and effort they spent investing into their crush's lives. It's an entitled generation with the world at their fingertips.

Youth Involvement: A survey of parents of children 2 to 8 years old was conducted to investigate parasocial relationships and experiences with parasocial breakup among young children. Results indicated that boys were significantly more likely to have a female favorite character at a younger age than at their current age, but girls were no more likely to have a male favorite character at a younger age than at their current age (Bond and Calvert 2014). As children aged and transitioned to new favorite media characters, boys' favorite characters became more masculine and girls' favorite characters became more feminine (Bond and Calvert 2014).

Child maturation, the influence of other media characters, and habituation to the character were the most commonly cited reasons for children experiencing parasocial breakup. Findings are discussed in terms of the similarities between face-to-face friendship dissolution and parasocial breakup among children and the importance of character gender to children's PSR, especially as children mature (Bond and Calvert 2014). Stereotypes: Television as a whole has helped “to shape beliefs, attitudes and values (Dodds 2015).” With fans developing close relationships with the characters in the show, fans could be at risk of adopting the reality that is presented to them as their own.

Past research has shown Friends reinforces gender stereotypes heavily throughout all ten seasons of the show. Because of the close relationships formed between the viewers and characters, viewers may hold society to those same stereotypical standards. One possible explanation for why these parasocial relationships are formed relates to the uses and gratifications theory. Uses and gratifications theory assumes that each viewer has individual differences that cause him or her to seek out different information (Dodds 2015). For uses and gratifications to apply, the audience must be active. The viewers who are actively engaging with the characters on screen are most likely to develop parasocial relationships.

It is important to note that the parasocial relationships do not replace relationships with friends, “but rather complement social relationships (Dodds 2015).” Fan discourse helped shape “the television experience by constructing social relationships with characters (Dodds 2015).” The fans were able to put their own frames on what was being shown to them each episode. They were only able to do this because of the advances in technology that allowed online discourse. This changed the television industry because now fans do not just watch television, but they experience it. As great as it is for a viewer to have this connection with a character, there could be a lot of potential harm done.

Friends may have had a negative impact on our generation, despite the overall popularity of the show. In summary, parasocial relationships are effective yet damaging. Countless studies point out the problems for those who carry on the one-sided relationships and how the effects can lead to loneliness. Whether its twenty-something in college or children as young as two years of age, media dependency has become a huge problem in the modern world. As much fun as a parasocial relationship may be, the other person doesn't even know your name, therefore cannot fulfill the need of human interaction that we all need, and crave. The parasocial relationships developed between viewers and characters can have significant effects on the viewer.

Therefore it is imperative to start calling this out to make viewers more aware, and have better control of the effects so they don't turn off the television set to feel depressed after seeing a happily-ever-after that has yet to happen within their own lives. Production companies also need to be made aware of these events to lessen gender or race stereotypes that people may be perceived as real. This idea isn’t new, and it not going anywhere, therefore we need to get on top of what dangers parasocial relationships are doing for each and everyone of us in the long run. Research Questions and Hypothesis: (RQ1) Do parasocial relationships harm far more than they help? It is predicted that associations between loneliness and the use of communication channels will be positively linked. They feel good in the moment, and are helpful to brands and celebrities product endorsements but don’t help those who hold the relationships.

How do we get roped into certain parasocial relationships? If each and every one of us has different relationships and they are formed on our own, what type of reactions do we have with people who have the same one? Or how does it affect the relationship with close friends if the said “fangirls” are both convinced they will end up marrying X?  Parasocial relationships leave people feeling lonelier when they turn off the program. Whether it's the end of a show, getting your news three times a day from the same news anchor, we feel as though we owe it to our one sided relationships to keep coming back each week to tune back in. Those with higher media literacy are not as affected by parasocial relationships.

If you are aware of what these “beloved” celebrities are doing, you still may enjoy it when they makes you feel special, but are less likely to give into whatever gimmick they are trying to sell. Method Participants: The desired sample will be pulled from university students who attend High Point University, North Carolina A&T State University, and lastly University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Since university students are notorious for binge watching popular streaming networks, such as Netflix, they seemed like the best choice for testing.

These universities were chosen due to differences in ethnicities and background to further test whether that makes a difference at all. High Point University is a PWI (Predominantly White Institution), A&T is an HBC (Historically Black College), and lastly UNCG is the most diverse university in the triad. Procedures: Loneliness will be measured with the revised UCLA Loneliness Scale. This has been done before by Alan M. Rubin Elizabeth M. Perse Robert A. Powell while at Kent State University in 1985. This process is a 20-item scale designed to measure one's subjective feelings of loneliness as well as feelings of social isolation (Rubin 1985). Participants rate each item on a scale from 1 (Never) to 4 (Often). Respondents will be asked about their agreement with each of 30 statements of reasons for watching their favorite local television news program. Five response options, ranging from “not at all” (1) to “exactly” (5) like their own reasons for viewing, were used.

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