Psychology of Celebrity Topics Social Psychological & Evolutionary Explanations of Attraction to Celebrities Research into Extreme Behaviour of Fans SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL AND EVOLUTIONARY EXPLANATIONS OF ATTRACTION OF CELEBRITIES SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL In this section we will be looking at 2 explanations: Parasocial relationships Absorption-Addiction Model Parasocial Relationships (PSR’s) A parasocial relationship is one in which an individual is attracted to another individual (usually a celebrity), but the target individual is usually unaware of the existence of the person who has created the relationship. Such relationships, common among celebrities and their fans, might be particularly appealing to some individuals because the relationships make few demands. Because a fan does not usually have a ‘real’ relationship with a celebrity, they do not run the risk of criticism or rejection, as might be the case in a real relationship. Schiappa et al. (2007) carried out a meta-analysis of studies of PSR’s. From this they concluded that PSR’s were most likely to form with television celebrities who were seen as attractive and similar in some way to the 1
Transcript
Psychology of Celebrity
TopicsSocial Psychological & Evolutionary Explanations of Attraction to Celebrities Research into Extreme Behaviour of Fans
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL AND EVOLUTIONARY EXPLANATIONS OF ATTRACTION OF CELEBRITIES
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL
In this section we will be looking at 2 explanations:
Parasocial relationships
Absorption-Addiction Model
Parasocial Relationships (PSR’s)
A parasocial relationship is one in which an individual is attracted to another individual (usually a celebrity), but the target individual is usually unaware of the existence of the person who has created the relationship.
Such relationships, common among celebrities and their fans, might be particularly appealing to some individuals because the relationships make few demands. Because a fan does not usually have a ‘real’ relationship with a celebrity, they do not run the risk of criticism or rejection, as might be the case in a real relationship.
Schiappa et al. (2007) carried out a meta-analysis of studies of PSR’s. From this they concluded that PSR’s were most likely to form with television celebrities who were seen as attractive and similar in some way to the
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viewer. An important additional factor appeared to be that they were perceived as real or that they acted in a believable way. Schiappa et al believed that if the celebrity acted in a believable way, viewers were able to compare how they would behave in similar situations.
Research by Derrick et al. (2008) with US undergraduates, examined the relationship between self-esteem, identification with a PSR and the perceived discrepancies between the ideal and actual self.
Those with low self-esteem saw their favourite celebrity as very similar to their ideal selves
Those with high self-esteem saw their favourite celebrity as similar to their actual selves.
Evaluation of Parasocial Relationships
Use RP1 p. 231 and the Textbook p. 427 to complete AO2/AO3 notes on Parasocial Relationships
-Parasocial Relationships / Are they dysfunctional?
Commonly believed to be dysfunctional, because the person is lonely, but research does not support this. Schiappa’s work shows that loneliness is not as predictor of PSR’s forming. Some research shows those who are more socially able are more likely to engage in PSR’s.
+Benefits of Parasocial Relationships
Many social benefits offered by PSR’s. They are models of soc beh (e.g. intimacy) and an opp to learn cultural values (e.g. importance of marriage). Soap opera chars are seen repeatedly and may lead to less uncertainty about soc relationships.
Attachment Style and Parasocial Relationships - Cole and Leets (99)
Attachment Style
How likely they are to form a PSR
Reason
Anxious- ambivalent
most likely They have concern that others will not reciprocate ones desire for intimacy. They turn to TV chars as a way of satisfying their ‘unrealistic and often unmet relational needs.’
Anxious-avoidant
least likely They find it difficult to develop intimate relationships and are therefore less likely to seek them with real or fictional people.
Parasocial Relationships and Eating Disorders – Maltby et al (2005)
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Found a link with adolescent females btwn poor body image and PSR’s with celebs who are slim. This may predispose them to EDs. Disappears in early adulthood.
Absorption-Addiction Model
McCutcheon et al (2002)
Some people go beyond the normal admiration of a celeb. Some people with a ‘compromised identity’ become completely absorbed in the celeb in order to establish their own identity. They lack meaningful relationships in real life. They become addicted to the relationship. As with any addiction we become more extreme in our need for the ‘fix’.
Giles and Maltby (06) outlined 3 levels in the process:
Entertainment-social – a fan becomes attracted coz they are entertaining and are a source of soc interaction/gossip. E.g. ‘I love learning about their life.’
Intense-personal – fan has intense and compulsive feelings about celeb. E.g. ‘She/he is my soul-mate.’ Leads to development of passive PSR. Kept a secret from friends so it is exclusively theirs.
Borderline-pathological – typically there is uncontrollable behaviour/ fantasy about celeb. E.g. ‘if I went to their house they would be happy to see me. Believes they are in a ‘real’ relationship.
The celebrity attitude scale (McCutcheon, 2004)
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Use the following scale in response to the items below:
1. If I were to meet my favourite celebrity in person, he/she would already somehow know that I am his/her biggest fan
2. I share with my favourite celebrity a special bond that cannot be described in words
3. I am obsessed by the details of my celebrity’s life
4. My friends and I like to discuss what my favourite celebrity has done
5. When something good happens to my favourite celerity I feel like it happened to me
6. One of the main reasons I maintain an interest in my favourite celebrity is that doing so gives me a temporary escape from my life’s problems
7. I have pictures and/or souvenirs of my favourite celebrity which I always keep in the same place
8. The successes of my favourite celebrity are my successes also
9. I enjoy watching , reading or listening to my favourite celebrity because it means a good time
10. I consider my favourite celebrity to be a soulmate
11. I have frequent thoughts about my favourite celebrity, even when I don’t want to
12. When my favourite celebrity dies (or died) I will feel (or felt) like dying too
13. I love to talk to others who admire my favourite celebrity
14. When something bad happens to my favourite celebrity I feel like it happened to me
15. Learning the life story of my favourite celebrity is a lot of fun
16. I often feel compelled to learn about personal habits of my favourite celebrity
17. If I were lucky enough to meet my favourite celebrity, and he/she asked me to do something illegal as a favour, I would probably do it
18. It is enjoyable just to be with others who like my favourite celebrity
19. When my favourite celebrity fails or loses at something I feel like a failure myself
20. If someone gave me several thousands of dollars (pounds) to do with as I pleased, I would consider spending it on a personal possession (like a napkin or paper plate) once used by my favourite celebrity
21. I like watching and hearing about my favourite celebrity when I am in a large group of people
22. Keeping up with the news about my favourite celebrity is a n entertaining pastime
23. News about my favourite celebrity is a pleasant break from a harsh world
- Borderline-pathological: Questions 16, 17, 20 and 23
Evaluation of Absorption-Addiction Model
The Absorption-Addiction Model: Links to Mental Health
Maltby et al (03) used EPQ to test personality and celeb worship.
Entertainment-social level linked to extraversion.
Intense-personal level linked to neuroticism (related to anx and dep.n). Supporting the idea that higher levels linked to poorer mental health.
Evaluation of the Absorption-Addiction Model and Body Image
The type of interaction a person has with celeb does seem to determine the effect on body image. The findings from Maltby et al (05) (page 3) show that the strongest effect is for adol.s who have an intense-personal relationship.
EVOLUTIONARY
These are a contrast to the social psychological explanations. We are going to look at 2 evolutionary explanations:
Attraction to creative individuals
Celebrity gossip
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I-P: Total score:
IP is out of 45
B-P: Total score:
BP is out of 20
Attraction to Creative Individuals
• Human beings have a particular characteristic of its love of novelty (known as ‘neophilia’).
• Before arrival of TV and computers, our ancestors would have had to amuse each other and neophilia would have led to evermore creative displays from potential mates .
• This would explain many of the characteristics that are universally and uniquely developed in humans e.g. music, art and humour, all which are highly valued during mate choice .
• We might therefore explain our attraction to celebrities as an extension of our love of these characteristics.
• We are drawn to individuals who display these creative skills and since these skills are regularly broadcast into our homes, make our attraction to such figures even greater.
• The mating mind (Miller 2000) claims that sexual selection through mate choice was important in human evolution.
• Miller (2000) argued that whereas natural selection might tend to favour minds with survival-enhancing skills, sexual selection might favour minds prone to inventing attractive, imaginative fantasies – the kinds of fantasy that nowadays we witness in the work of artists, film stars and musicians.
Evaluation of Attraction to Creative Individuals
Comparative Evidence (textbook)
Neophilia in animals is an important factor in bird song. As novel/complex songs make a bird more attractive. Duck (82) says that boredom with a partner is a common reason for termination. So partners who offer variety and creativity have longer more reproductively successful relationships.
Evidence for an Evolved Love of Creativity
Shiraishi et al (06) found that some ind.ls have a gene that means they have more MAOA (enzyme) which is linked to novelty seeking. This suggests a genetic origin for some people’s preference for creative people.
Celebrity Gossip
Why is gossip good for a social group?
Why is gossip good for reputations?
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Why do we gossip about media celebrities?
Evaluation of Celebrity Gossip
+Research Support for the Adaptive Role of Celebrity Gossip - De Backer (2007)
800 people surveyed. Ps’ said that gossip was a useful way of getting info about the soc gp. Amount of media exposure was also a predictor of interest in celebs. Concluded that media expos leads to the misperception that celebs are part of soc gp, therefore explain the interest in celeb gossip.
-Female Preoccupation with Celebrity?
Why are women more obsessed with celebrities than men? It is estimated that 67% of readers of celebrity magazines are women. Could it be that on the African plain men gained no reproductive advantage from knowing about the gossip in the group? This seems unlikely – knowledge is power for males and females alike? Although it is hypothesised that women had to rely on more subtle techniques of survival (whereas men could rely more on brute strength), it surely would still have conferred some reproductive advantage for men to have been aware of alliances within their social group.
-Fame as a means to reproductive fitness?
This argument sounds good until it is noted that many famous celebrities are also very attractive. Surely people don’t strive to be famous simply to attract a potential mate? Ignoring the fact that celebrities’ good looks may be manufactured by the surgeon’s knife or the photographer’s software package, it would appear to be true that the majority of celebrities are more physically attractive than the average member of the public.
These attractive individuals would have a good chance of passing on their genes even without the added advantage associated with their celebrity status. Perhaps this ‘gene pool’ argument was true in the past, but with the emphasis on visual media today, being beautiful is almost a prerequisite (requirement) for being a celebrity. Fame as a sexual strategy cannot explain why some people place the importance of fame above any sexual strategies.
Being a homosexual is one of the worst sexual strategies in order to pass on one’s DNA (even recognising that some homosexuals do choose to have children). Here the evolutionary argument suggests that becoming a celebrity is a means of passing
on something about our self to future generations without using children to achieve this goal. If we assume that most homosexuals do not want to pass on their DNA through having children, then they can leave their
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mark for the future through their fame. Homosexuals desire fame as a mark of posterity. Fame then acts like a symbolic reproduction (Giles, 2000).
In Roman times, the famous were preserved in pictures and statues; nowadays the famous are preserved on film, in the newspapers and on YouTube. We can now replicate ourselves without the need to have children. Long-gone celebrities can still be seen on film and video as though they are still alive – their presence lives on long after their funeral.
-Practical Research Difficulties
Investigating the psychology of celebrity is incredibly difficult. Psychology in its quest for scientific credibility has always avoided areas of research that are difficult to undertake in a quantitative way. If it can’t be studied in a laboratory, the topic tends to be ignored. The psychology of celebrity is such a case. The research area lends itself to a more qualitative analysis.
Another problem with psychological research is the difficulty of obtaining participants. It is never easy to recruit 40 members of the ‘normal’ population who have the time to fill in a questionnaire on their behaviour and attitudes.
One further problem is that the area of celebrity is a relatively new one for psychological research. Usually, academics trawl through previous literature to understand where the research is and how they can move it forward. There is little research in this area and thus it does not (as yet form part of mainstream academic psychology (Giles, 2000).
Exam Question
Outline and evaluate two explanations of the attraction of celebrity. (25 marks)
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AO1
Outline PSR’s.
AO2/3
Evaluate PSR’s
AO1
Outline attraction to creative individuals
AO2/3
Evaluate attraction to creative individuals
AO2/3
Comparison between explanations. Brief acknowledgement that there are other explanations.
RESEARCH INTO EXTREME BEHAVIOUR OF FANS (intense fandom)
Celebrity Worship
Recap here the 3 levels of the absorption-addiction model.
How common are the 3 levels?
How do celebrity worshippers differ from people who are not celebrity worshippers?
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Is intense fandom always for an individual?
Evaluation of Celebrity Worship
+ Key Research – Maltby et al (2001)
Benefits of worship Negative consequences of worship
Cheung & Yue (2003)
Stalking
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Study description Study evaluation
Stalking is repeated and persistent attempts to impose unwanted communication/contact on another person.
The two types of stalker are:
Love obsession
Simple obsession
Mullen (2008) looked at 20,000 cases of stalking the royal family. 80% involved people with serious mental illnesses, like schizophrenia.
Pick three cases from the 15 nuttiest and comment on them in relation to the theory.
Case 1 Case 2 Case 3
Evaluation of Stalking
Kampus & Emmelkamp (2006) found that 25% stalking cases ended up in violence, and 2% to murder. Therefore understanding this phenomena is useful as it will help prevent violent crimes. They also identified 5 types of stalkers:
Erotomanic – usually female with belief that older man is in love with her.
Obsessional – stalks after a real relationship has gone sour
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Resentful – stalks to frighten or distress
Predatory – may precipitate sexual attacks
Psychotic – targets famous people (this is clearly the one we are interested in)
This suggests the term ‘stalker’ is too broad.
Attachment Style and Stalking – Kienlan (98)
Attachment Style
Reason for stalking
Anxious- ambivalent
Anxious-avoidant
In 1997 Kienlan et al also found that in a small sample of imprisoned US stalkers a majority had lost their primary caregiver in childhood and had a major loss in the 6 months prior to the onset of stalking.
McCutcheon et al (2006) also found that those (of the 300 students questioned) who had insecure attachments as children were more likely to say that celebrity stalking behaviour was okay.
Cyberstalking
What is cyberstalking?
What is the advantage of stalking in this way?
How common is it?
Is it taken as seriously?
Exam Question
Discuss research into intense fandom. (25 marks)
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Mullen et al (99) – Study of stalkers
Care should be taken when studying people with mental disorders. They should be offered appropriate support, debriefing and therapy.
Obsessive, rejected stalkers have been found to respond well to psychotherapy but psychopathic ones have been highly resistant to treatment. This suggests that they are definitely different types.
