Parasocial Compensation Hypothesis

Abstract

In America, socializing with friends has become a functional alternative to watching television. Such a drastic change in how we spend free time demands a closer look at media effects. The study at hand invokes intrapersonal communication research and parasocial interactions and relationships from the media effects literature, synthesizing a new line of research in the process. We ask, “What functions and characteristics of parasociability predict parasocial compensation for real-life interaction?” To explore this question, we combined data based on respondent identification numbers from two larger surveys that measured functions and characteristics of parasocial. An ordinary least squares regression with compensation as the focal variable revealed that parasocial thinking, when functioning as internal rehearsal and self-understanding, and when characterized by variety and self-dominance, predicts parasociability as compensation for human interaction. Retroactive parasocial thinking negatively predicted compensation. The bottom line is this: Under certain circumstances, people choose parasocial relationships over real-life relationships. These findings support the continuing push to explore parasocial relationships as an imaginative force rather than as simple by-products of media exposure.

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