Table of Contents
Parasocial Interactions and Relationships with Media
Characters—An Inventory of 60 Years of Research . 4
1. Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
A. Definition of concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
B. Desideratum and research foci . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2. Methodological procedure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
A. Literature search methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
B. Selection and exclusion of publications . . . . . 6
C. Categorization and processing of the studies . 7
General information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Object of investigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Data collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
3. Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A. Research topics then and now . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Publications over the course of time . . . . . . . 9
Parasocial phenomena
in different types of media . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Parasocial phenomena with fictional
versus nonfictional
media characters . . . . 11
B. Methodological approach and data analysis . . 11
Research methods used to study
parasocial phenomena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Specifications of the investigated construct . . 12
Measurement instruments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Typical composition of samples . . . . . . . . . . . 13
C. Overall results and patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Influence of media users’ characteristics
on parasocial phenomenon . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Influence of media characters’ characteristics
on parasocial phenomenon . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Reception phenomenal accompanying
parasocial phenomenon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Effects mediated or influenced by
parasocial phenomena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
4. 60 years of research—A conclusion . . . . . . . . . . 16
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Appendix A. Complete list of publications
according to their media context . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1. Film and television . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2. Radio and music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
3. Print media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
4. New media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
5. Intermedia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Book reviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32
Briefly Noted . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37
Recommended Citation
Liebers, Nicole and Schramm, Holger
(2019)
"Parasocial Interactions andRelationships with MediaCharacters–An Inventory of 60Years of Research,"
Communication Research Trends: Vol. 38:
Iss.
2, Article 1.
Available at:
https://scholarcommons.scu.edu/crt/vol38/iss2/1