#parasocial interactions

[para-prowess]

About Me

Hello! My name is Chase.

I'm a sophomore with ADHD studying Psychology at Colorado State University. My other interests include watching YouTube, Twitch, and playing video games. I also have a precious cat named Moose.

Currently, I am taking a course called writing arguments in which my assignment is to write a research paper about a subject of my choosing.

This might be an assignment but I'm passionate about the subject I chose: parasocial relationships.

I have first person interest in parasocial relationships because I've been in the parasocial community here on Tumblr for quite a long time. Although I never posted about my own directly, I have parasocial relations as well.

I'll be posting my reflections on articles I find, personal thoughts, and I want to receive feedback from the parasocial and f/o community here on Tumblr.

If you have any questions or want to share your experiences, my inbox and asks are always open! Additionally, you can contact me at elchase555@gmail.com.

Edit; As this blog and class went on, my subject changed but my passion didn't. There are other assignments I did and their reflections here but I am always open to discussing parasocial relations.

[inkskinned]

you know, you know. no gods, no masters, no kings on pedestals. everyone is fallible. death of the author. you know! you are balanced about your intake of media - you allow the wiggle room, the grace, the gratitude, the skepticism. nobody above criticism.

but still. a weird gut-punch feeling, something akin to betrayal. you read the article. surprise! an author you love is actually: a serial fucking predator.

well, shit. what now. no, you knew he was a person (all people are), but now you're wondering - what have i overlooked by accident? what messages have i internalized that are strange and cruel? and also, like, what the fuck?

his actions lay a thick glaze on top of everything. like each place is now ruined, opaque in a new way. but okay, fine, you've done this before. you knew better, right? you've been betrayed by many a cherished childhood author.

still, this stickiness. fuck. can you pick up that book again. will you read it to your children. you've recommended it to others - will you ever do that again? and of course, of course, no parasocial relationships. you were theoretically above this kind of sentiment. but the artist informs the art, right.

so it's not something as clear-cut as feeling he owed you, specifically (a stranger) better behavior - just that you kind of, in a distant and odd way... sort of trusted him to do better. it's not like a real trust or something speakable, just the faint hope that the product (good books) was a thin representation of the soul. now it feels like the product (good? books?) was a mask. in some small or insignificant way, your previous support of this person lent them power. your money and your time and your laughter.

and the thing is - you have this terrible, echoing sensation. how many times will this happen? over and over. you find out that the singer you love is actually a predator. you learn over drinks that your favorite high school english teacher is in jail for what he did to her. you listen to the news idly and suddenly discover that a woman you used to idolize has been abusing her kids for an actual eon.

what can you touch without the static melting off. you can't even really complain about it too much (you were supposed to know better, and besides, you don't want the same re-split "it's not your fault, love what you love" basic advice), but now it's here. somehow, it feels like - you let him into your life.

it's not that things need to be pure or an artist has to be like, endlessly perfect, mindful. demure. it's more just this terrible truth that has been replayed through your veins so often it feels criminally vain. power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. did you want any one person to be worth that power?

it's just that he wrote books where he seemed to understand that. he seemed to know about hierarchies and unfair systems and bigotry and privilege. you thought they were books about what it means to struggle. you thought they were about having power and still using it for good rather than for control. he spooned you a narrative of being a good guy, a kind soul. you fucking bought what that fucking monster sold.

maybe that's why they were fantasies, after all.

[luxlightly]

"If you're hurt by finding out that a person you admired did something bad or are worried about the idea they might, it shows you need to not form attachments to people you don't personally know."

I have bad news for you about how literally the entirety of human socialization and the human mind work. You can say "here's a stick from off the ground. his name is Stanley and he has a loving family" and then break the stick and people will feel hurt because they formed a positive connection to Stanley. Humans project attachment onto everything. Asking people not to feel connections to other humans is not feasible. It's not possible and, if it were, it sure as hell wouldn't be healthy.

You didn't do anything wrong if you feel hurt that someone you didn't personally know did something wrong. You're not parasitic or obsessive for wanting people you don't personally know to be good people. Being devastated that someone you liked did something horrible isn't a sign you liked them too much, it's a sign you have the basic human ability to form emotional and social connections. Your responsibility is being aware of those connections and behaving in ways that are healthy, respectful, and keep you and others safe.

Trying to just not admire people or not feel a connection to other humans won't work. Focus instead on being aware of what your relationships to other people are, what actions on your part are acceptable given that level of relationship, what actions are acceptable on their part, and what level of relationship it's realistic or healthy to project. And be ready, as with all things in life, to change your views on something or someone when presented with new information, even if you have very strong emotional connections to the subject. For example: "I'd love to get a cup of coffee with the celebrity I don't know and talk with them about a film they're in. I imagine that would be nice." <- normal human emotion "I will go to this celebrity I don't know and ask them, apropos of nothing, to get a coffee with me/I expect this celebrity I've never met WILL go to coffee with me" <- Unrealistic level of projected relationship. Crosses boundaries of normal human interactions between strangers.

"I'm devastated this actor I liked was an abuser" <- normal human emotion

"I won't believe that this actor was an abuser because I like him and therefore can tell he wouldn't do that" <- Unrealistic and unhealthy level of projected relationship. Unsafe for you and others.

You can't just "not admire" people, yes, even people you don't know personally. Instead, be careful to make sure your admiration of someone doesn't affect your ability to make judgements about them.

[inkbirdie]

Might be a bit early but i'm confident we can make it though this y'all hold strong smoshblr

[lay1306]

I just had a dream that Dan was writing children's novels under a pen name but I was reading one and the writing style felt familiar, so I approached him to ask him about it (cause he was there for some reason) and he just looked at me, smiled, leaned into me and whispered: 'Don't tell Phil, but how do you think we're paying the mortgage when he keeps buying sweets' and then he just disappeared?????

[wttcsms]

guys, i hate to admit this but i can't commit to the bit of being a "minors or ageless or blank blogs get BLOCKED" girlie. u know... i'd love to say 'not on my watch, kids!' but im like... a comically bad, way-past-retirement age, sleeping-on-the-job mall security guard. im not catching any of u blank blogs.

[moredifferentthanusual]

Thinking bout one fans story of their dan and phil meet and greet where they wanted to get their bi flag signed but asked if they could also sign their ticket because they couldn't show their parents the flag. Thinking bout how they said Dan was particularly sweet and as he handed them their ticket he said "One day." Thinking bout how Dan wasn't out to his family yet at the time

[ramsighting]

I want to fuck up a harmful like they do to me.

I want to make them just as dependent, I want them to need me.

I want them to get jealous just so I can come back before pulling away again. I want them to seek my approval like I seek theirs.

I want them to be possessive, I want them to worry when I’m not answering.

Lets make each other worse:)

[fantastic-nonsense]

I cannot emphasize enough that if someone is talking about a Youtuber there is a 99.99% chance I do not know who they're talking about

[godsworstson]

always thinking about the fact that rake is the only one who's still friends with pretty much the whole cky/vlb crew

[para-prowess]

Parasocial Interactions And Aggressive Personalities

In a search for an article that may challenge my beliefs about parasocial relationships, I found a peer-reviewed article about research that was conducted to see if more aggressive individuals identify and have parasocial interactions with aggressive television characters.

While this premise does not directly counter any of my existing beliefs on the matter, it certainly broadens my horizons because I haven't considered aggression in relation to PSIs (Parasocial Interactions). Therefore, I found it important to consider for my research.

In other words, by the end of reading it and chewing on it for awhile, I didn't get a new perspective. Rather, it gave me a different colored lens for my existing perception.

Photo from indianexpress.com.

The research article in question is titled Viewer Aggression and Homophily, Identificatiton, and Parasocial Relationships With Television Characters and was published in 2010 by Keren Eyal and Alan M. Rubin.

Eyal and Rubin's definitions of homophily, identification, and parasocial interactions (PSIs), are as follows:

"Homophily is the degree to which people who interact are similar in beliefs, education, social status, and the like. It can be objective or subjective."

From Hoffner's study (cited by Eyal and Rubin), "Identification refers to a viewer sharing a character’s perspective and vicariously participating in the character’s experiences when viewing."

From Horton and Wohl's study (cited by Eyal and Rubin), "Parasocial interaction (PSI) reflects media interaction and is a “seeming face-to-face relationship  between spectator and performer. It is a relationship of friendship with a media personality based on felt affective ties with that persona."

This trio of definitions gives me vocabulary to describe some of what I already understand about PSRs. I wanted to say these are almost like a foundation but it's more like elements to a PSR.

We like people who are like our self. Someone in a PSR might have homophily with the character or person in question. Identification can go hand-in-hand with homophily. It might be easier to identify with a character or person who shares similar values and perspectives. PSI is simple. Anyone in a PSR will have interactions with the character or person in question.

Now, more about the article.

Eyal and Rubin's results indicated that:

Aggressive individuals identify more with aggressive characters.

Aggressive individuals are more likely to have PSIs with more aggressive characters.

Aggressive individuals may not necessarily form parasocial relationships with more aggressive characters.

Additionally, "Identification was the only concept of the three that was predicted by viewer’s own aggression beyond variance of gender." (Eyal & Rubin, 2010) In other words, if a person has aggressive tendencies then they are more likely to identify with a character regardless of their gender.

They could not definitively conclude why that was the case, but, as cited by the researchers and paraphrased by me, Cohen's idea is this; identification is seeing the world through the character's own eyes. It's first person. It's personal. Meanwhile, homophily is more of a third person perspective. I can see or my friends can see that I'm like someone but it's not direct. Gender matters less when it comes to values and first person perspective and matters more when comparing external factors.

An additional conclusion I'd like to explore later is that, "Men scored higher on all measures of the relationship with aggressive characters." (Eyal & Rubin, 2010) I have determined that this doesn't actually matter in my research. I'm exploring PSRs, not aggression and not gender differences.

This leaves me with some more things I want to look into.

Why weren't more aggressive individuals not more likely to form a PSR with aggressive characters? Is this a personality thing or is it just not common to form PSRs?

Maybe it was an experimental factor. PSRs seem to be formed with characters people seek out on their own. Perhaps this setting isn't fit for forming PSRs.

That makes me wonder, what brings someone to form a PSR in the first place? Why would one person be more or less likely than another?

Much to think about.

Eyal, Keren, and Alan M. Rubin. “Viewer Aggression and Homophily, Identification, and Parasocial Relationships with Television Characters.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, vol. 47, no. 1, 2003, pp. 77–98., https://doi.org/10.1207/s15506878jobem4701_5.

[vocalux]

could u make a flag for PPSAD :3 would make the flag myself but my iPad broke -w- https://www.tumblr.com/mynameisuranus/765902591482888192/platform-parasocial-attachment-disorder-ppsad?source=share

— platform parasocial attachment disorder / ppsad

flag for individuals who have ppsad !

— honestly i liked these , i wish i had it just so i could use them

[madnesswithmadhu]

me watching grown ass man lose their shit when their fav girl vtuber interacts with a male one (they're not appealing to their "fantasy")

[sn0wp1anets]

observations about joel (mostly speech stuff) and interactions with others bc ive been hyperfixated since the beginning of time (also theres alot of bs commentary im sorry)

general stuff:

very very british like extremely british

'bloody' and 'blooming' ALOT - when he's annoyed or shocked or offended (im gonna call this his pseudo swearing for the rest of this for convenience)

instead of very he says 'well' sometimes (e.g. "this bloody pico park music is well annoying) and "absolutely"

instead of really he says 'proper' sometimes so "stress is proper northern" etc

instead of 'i haven't' he says "i've not"

he gives an explanation for basically everything he does and instead of because he says 'as' alot

'to be honest' "i bloody hate woodwork to be honest" (sometimes he says 'to be honest with you' too)

'innit' occasionally "it's like waterslide innit"

'like so'

'by the look of it'

he gets irritated really easily - "for goodness sake" and he'll start cutting himself off alot "this bloody-" and also his voice gets much more high pitched and his pseudo swearing gets way more frequent. also 'blooming heck'

(and also this isn't super relevant but when he gets mad all his friends start commenting on it and its the funniest thing- in the overcooked stream as soon as he starts getting annoyed everyones like 'oh here he is')

i didn't know if i should put this in a specific section but he says 'babe' alot - not just to lizzie but to jimmy like ALOT and also in general - i'll talk about this a bit more later tho !

pauses alot: in between words/phrases, and also before he answers questions (this is not as often but also if he wants someone to stop him- he was playing scrabble and was basically asking if someone could spell out vagina so he was slowly going 'and a g....and an i...and a n...' etcetc idk this isnt relevant i just thought it was worth mentioning)

he's kinda an oversharer 😭 ? (this is lh hes 31 im sure he shares what he thinks is appropriate) but at any given moment he starts giving details about his life- a kinda memorable example of this is in mcc26(?) when w*lbur made fun of his accent so he started telling a story about his grandfather and giving alot of details about him after he said he couldnt talk too much about it AND grian begged him to stop

repeats things (especially when he's annoyed) : "game's a bloody joke. game's a bloody joke"

he basically never says 'oh my god' its always 'oh my gosh' or 'oh gosh' sometimes its 'oh jesus'

his voice is generally higher pitched and more expressive in videos than in streams but this is more of a general cc thing than a specific joel thing

very confident in his builds (AS HE SHOULD BE !!!) and he'll share his thoughts alot : "i think it's come together really well" "lovely" "i'm really happy with it/with how it's turned out" etcetc

when he narrates he uses a mixture of 'I' and 'We'. what i've noticed is he uses I for his thoughts ("i feel like" "i think") and we for everything else ("we need" "we're quite high in the sky" etc)

'genuinely'

'what (are) you on about'

'what the heck'

he will say very random (kind of odd) things just out of nowhere as if its normal and he'll only realize it's weird when someone questions it? e.g. the mumbo trauma dumping bit in SL, or in one of jimmy's streams he said 'until i get back to the hotel if yk what i mean' and jimmys like 'i dont' and joel just goes 'idk either'

accent stuff:

it's really recognizable idk what to say

very northern: hes from yorkshire - his accent used to be stronger in his old videos but you can definitely still hear it (like its still super different from grian or like mumbo idk)

his 'th' sounds come out as 'f' (idk if this is an accent thing or a joel thing but he's talked about it and said his family members have it too)

again not sure if this is an accent or joel thing but when he says any word with 'con' he says it kinda differently- it's hard to describe but for example when most people say convention the 'on' sound is more like a 'un' sound? whereas with joel its very much an 'o' sound like in 'box' or 'coffee' (genuinely have no idea how else to explain it but in phonetic symbols- joel essentially never says /ʌ/ it's almost always /ɒ/ when its a 'con' word)

jimmy-

NICKNAMES !!! 'jim' is used alot - more than anyone else and one of the only people who calls him this. hes used 'mr neutron' too (idk how many times'

(he also doesnt actually say tim/timmy often and when he does its exclusively when grian is present)

typical british male friendship nicknames: 'lad' 'big man'

when he joins jimmy's stream he always says hi in a very dramatic way?? usually with a pretty deep voice (idk this is just something i noticed)

he calls him a loser alot?

(this might be more of a bad boys point) but joel is generally not that mean to jimmy? definitely he's meaner than he was a few years ago but that makes sense because they weren't as close but. he'll call him a loser and stupid/idiot sometimes but his main 'bullying jimmy' momentsare usually always when he's with someone else (usually grian, sometimes fwhip)

'what are you doing jimmy' or sometimes 'what are you doing with your life'

lizzie:

'babe' like all the time. once lizzie mentioned that they don't even really use each other's names alot because they just say 'babe' all the time

oli:

ok so joel really doesn't use that much like modern internet language but oli does and then joel will pick up on it (its cute but also horrifying sometimes)- he kept saying 'dogs' in reference to feet after oli said it

they flirt alot but differently to how he does with jimmy (hes more passive whereas with jimmy he initiates it more idk how else to describe it)

he calls him 'man' sometimes

he's also really giggly around oli theyre adorable

(tbh theres so much more to say about oli and lizzie but idk if i have the energy and time for like 10+ years of interactions rn - and honestly alot more for everyone else too but like.)

grian:

in general joel picks up on people's energy etc and mimics it alot but it happens so much with grian specifically - this sounds very weird but the more time he spends with grian in one go the more he starts to act like grian (especially with interactions with jimmy)

[aestheteasteria]

My emotional reliance on fictional characters and parasocial relationships is reaching concerning levels, I think I need therapy and human touch perhaps.

[dreamyintersexouppy]

being a sex worker is like if someone pretended a service worker was a celebrity that held all the power in their dynamics and only the service worker could see the eggshells they were having walk on