COVID-19 Social and quasi-social relationships during social distance expansion

https://doi.org/10.1177/02654075211019129

Explanation

The COVID-19 pandemic provided a very unique opportunity to investigate how sudden and involuntary changes in social routines affected not only social relationships, but also parasocial relationships with fictional characters and celebrities.

In the results of a four-wave panel study conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic (N= 166), it was found that social relationships maintained stability during social distance among participants who increased mediated social engagement with friends and those with low attachment anxiety.

And parasocial intimacy with media personas increased over time, suggesting that favorite media personas became more meaningful as participants increased their social distance.

Parasocial intimacy increased parasocial engagement, decreased face-to-face social engagement with friends, increased mediated social engagement with friends, and increased with greater intensity among participants with lower attachment anxiety.

These results explain the potential impact of increased mediated social engagement with real-life friends on parasocial processing of celebrities and fictional characters.