#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.

[damneddualities]

Not really as a relationship in this regard denotes a continuing infatuation not a one off instance. Parasocial relationships can also be referred to as interactions as a way to denote the true lack of awareness of existence for the affected individual (the one receiving the attention versus supposedly giving it by doing their job as someone in media).

Parasocial relationships can be entirely neutral but they can also greatly and negatively impact your life. When regarding parasocial relationships the most important aspect is to be aware that it is in fact parasocial. When it starts affecting someone outside of their media interaction such as in personal relationships or with their mental health then it needs to be addressed as soon as possible

Like I said above, parasocial relationships can just be neutral you don’t have to have a positive or negative emotion attached to the person or entity in question for it to count as parasocial it can literally just be intrigue. That being said,thinking about the grocery store clerk who wished you a nice day and feeling happy isn’t really parasocial in the way that the previous poster seems to think.

i have news to break about parasocial relationships. everyone has them. oh did you get happy when you remembered the grocery store clerk who wished you a nice day a year ago? congratulations you've got a parasocial relationship. it's completely normal and something we all do. the word y'all are looking for is "invasive".

[inkbirdie]

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

[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.

[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?????

[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

[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")

[godsworstson]

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

[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

[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)

[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.

[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

[slidetoleft]

thinking about kevin day’s relationship to fans

thinking about kevin being raised as an exy prodigy, shocked and awed by how many people seem to really care about him

thinking about the first time a stranger tried to grab onto kevin out in public for a photo, for an autograph, for a chance to talk to the son of exy

thinking about kevin finding comfort in the reactions to him joining the raven’s line officially

thinking about the first headline kevin read after he escaped the nest

thinking about kevin unable to prevent his own heartbreak over how quickly they turn on him

thinking about the booing, the glaring, the insults kevin fields as he steps onto the court for the championship

thinking about the moment kevin scores the winning goal, the moment of pure silence as everyone stares at the scoreboard, broken only by riko’s scream

thinking about kevin advocating for his own privacy for the rest of his life, citing the danger of public pressure on the mental health of athletes

thinking of kevin coming to terms with how he is considered property by more than just the moriyamas, but still mourning the moments of pride, of validation, of genuine care he felt as a child from strangers screaming his name

[aestheteasteria]

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

[shikai-the-storyteller]

AWH... I'm skipping through Roier's QSMP Day 1 VOD because I'm looking for a specific thing, and I just noticed that when Jaiden stands in front of the group to do her introduction and her mic isn't working, Mariana laughs (not in a mean way, I laughed too) and Roier immediately smacks him and tells him off for laughing.

[Timestamp ~36m 50s, volume warning for Quackity's awful mic]

It's such a little thing, but I think it's really sweet in retrospect, especially considering how Roier and Jaiden have become such good friends in recent weeks :')

[xcarveoutmyheart]