Parasocial relationships: what are they and what are their causes?

This phenomenon explains much of the media impact of celebrities.

On TV, social networks, radio and other media, all kinds of media personalities appear in which we can identify with. From watching and listening to them, we feel as if we know them, as if they were people as close to us as our lifelong friends, our relatives or classmates.

Becoming familiar with a famous actor or a very influential youtuber is a very common experience, and can take the form of a long-lasting relationship with that media figure, despite the fact that, in essence, he or she is still a stranger.

This type of pseudo-relationship is called parasocial relationshipsa very interesting and common type of social interaction in the "mass media" era, which we will explore in more detail below.

What are parasocial relationships?

Let's imagine that we go through our city and we enter a store to do the purchase as every week. When entering we see Lionel Messi in the dairy aisle: what do we do? Of course, his presence does not leave us indifferent. We might take a photo with him, ask for his autograph or even dare to comment on his latest move. In short, we would behave in a very close, even intimate way, as if we had known him all our lives.

Regardless of how annoying we are to poor Messi, who only wanted to buy milk, all this is normal. It is quite natural that we want to get close to a character we have seen many times on TV and, if we are F.C. fans, we want to get closer to him. and, if we are fans of F. C. Barcelona, we have gone to see him play soccer live. But why do we feel confident enough to talk to him as if he were a friend? After all, he's just a random person on the street. We don't really know him, nor is he our friend.

The answer to all this is very simple: we have established a parasocial relationship with the soccer player. Parasocial relationships are false social relationships that develop towards any media character, real or fictitious, and that we perceive as if he were our friend.and that we perceive as if he were a person very close to us. We come to identify with him or her or we have some kind of feeling towards that person, from empathy or dislike going to the most absolute infatuation or boredom.

Parasocial relationships can be developed with practically any character appearing in the media, be it television, radio, social networks or paper media, although the media that use the screen produce this effect more intensely. These characters can be actors, singers, athletes, politicians and even non-real characters such as the protagonists of a series and cartoons (especially in children). We falsely believe that we know these characters simply because we have seen them in the media.

This effect is quite common, given that the mass media exert an important influence on popular culture and the general population. and the population in general. When we see a famous person, especially in television programs or Youtube videos, even though we are aware that what we see is a screen, our subconscious deceives us. The moment we are part of the audience, our mind thinks that what we are watching has been created expressly for us, making us become more involved in the life of the character in question.

The mass media knows all this and takes advantage of it. When a youtuber looks at the camera or a TV show host asks directly to the audience at home, they are using strategies so that we do not move away from the content. By looking at us in this way our brain, which is wired to interpret looking into our eyes as initiating and maintaining a conversation, perceives it as the one who is in the audience's eyes, perceives it as meaning that whoever is on the screen is talking to us, knows us, is aware that we are paying attention to them.It is aware that we are paying attention to them and even show empathy and feelings of attraction.

Origins of the concept

The concept of parasocial relationship was originally proposed by Donald Horton and Richard Wohl in 1956. These authors defined it as the fact that a person unconsciously creates a close relationship with a media person, experienced in a particularly intense way. Already at that time, they spoke of it as a unilateral relationship, in which the only person who is close to a media person is the media person.The only person who believes it is the audience and not the sender of the message.

The message is still addressed to a wide audience, of which we are a part. On this basis, we are still a more or less homogeneous mass in terms of the degree of reception of the message, i.e., we have not been told this or that, taking us into account as individuals, but as a mass to be influenced.

How long does a parasocial relationship last?

The duration of a parasocial relationship is indefinite, since it depends directly on how long the depends directly on how long the media personality in question is relevant.regardless of whether it is real or fictitious. The parasocial relationship will last as long as the content in which the character appears lasts.

To understand this better, let's imagine that we are watching a TV quiz show in which participants have to answer questions to win money. For the duration of the quiz we can feel connected to the contestants and even feel free to shout the answers at them while they are participating in the quiz. We can yell at them things like "but look how dumb you are! why didn't you choose B, THE BE!" or "If you had chosen the first answer you would now have €1,000 what's wrong with you, are you dumb? do you like being dumb?"

Despite the fact that these contestants don't hear us and are still complete strangers, we tell them everything. When the contest is over and these contestants are no longer in it, the parasocial relationship will cease to exist. Since they no longer appear on the screen because they have been eliminated from the contest, we no longer show empathy or animosity towards them. It is as if they have disappeared.

Another more enduring case is that of celebrities such as actors, singers and content creators. The parasocial relationships we establish with these types of media personalities tend to last longer, given their longer relevance in the media.. It may even be the case that we follow these characters professionally wherever they go. For example, soap opera actors, when they finish in one series usually get a role in another, making their fans watch the new series.

The same thing happens with singers. If we are fans of a performer, we have probably gone to see him or her in concert, but we also want to know everything he or she does. If we hear that he is going to give an interview on X program that we have never talked about, it is very likely that we will end up watching it.

If that same singer says he is retiring from the world of music and stops giving interviews, when he stops being media relevant many parasocial relationships will be broken. It is likely that his fans, especially those who had a "crush" on him will experience it especially badly, as if it were a sentimental breakup, but in a matter of a very short time there will be very few people left who will continue to idolize him.

Bibliographical references:

• Dibble, Jayson & Hartmann, Tilo & Rosaen, Sarah. (2015). Parasocial Interaction and Parasocial Relationship: Conceptual Clarification and a Critical Assessment of Measures. Human Communication Research. 42. 10.1111/hcre.12063.
• Rebecca B. Rubin & Michael P. McHugh (1987) Development of parasocial interaction relationships, Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 31:3, 279-292, DOI: 10.1080/08838158709386664
• Horton, D., & Wohl, R. (1956). Mass Communication and Para-social Interaction: Observations on Intimacy at a Distance. Estados Unidos
• Keren Eyal & Jonathan Cohen (2006) When Good Friends Say Goodbye: A Parasocial Breakup Study, Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 50:3, 502-523, DOI: 10.1207/s15506878jobem5003_9