Return to search

Fictional friends and enemies as first aid after ostracism? Experimentally investigating the potential of para-/orthosocial relationships in belongingness need restoration and emotion regulation

Being socially excluded seriously threatens individuals’ need to belong and emotional well-being. This article investigates to what extent different coping strategies help overcome these detrimental effects: thinking about real-life friends/enemies (i.e., orthosocial relationships, OSRs) and thinking about (dis)liked media characters (i.e., parasocial relationships, PSRs). Across three experiments (NPilot = 129, NStudy1 = 132, NStudy2 = 855), we first induced social exclusion using a virtual ball-tossing game. Afterward, we manipulated different relationship types and valences and compared them to non- or less-relational control conditions. As hypothesized, belongingness and emotional well-being increased from pre- to post-coping. This effect was fully mediated by perceived relationship closeness to the respective person(a). Highlighting that PSRs represent more than surrogates (i.e., secondary replacements of OSR), both relationship types did not differ in coping effectiveness. Moreover, positive relationships were more effective in fulfilling both coping goals than negative ones.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:DRESDEN/oai:qucosa:de:qucosa:92523
Date08 July 2024
CreatorsLutz, Sarah, Schneider, Frank M., Reich, Sabine, Schimmel, Michelle, Oechler, Hannah, Beinlich, Laura
ContributorsTechnische Universität Chemnitz, International Communication Association (ICA)
PublisherOxford University Press
Source SetsHochschulschriftenserver (HSSS) der SLUB Dresden
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typeinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion, doc-type:article, info:eu-repo/semantics/article, doc-type:Text
Rightsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
Relation1468-2958, 10.1093/hcr/hqae009

Page generated in 0.0022 seconds