Parasocial Interactions and Relationships in Early Adolescence.

Parasocial interactions and relationships, one-sided connections imagined with celebrities and media figures, are common in adolescence and might play a role in adolescent identity formation and autonomy development. We asked 151 early adolescents ( = 14.8 years) to identify a famous individual of whom they are fond; we examined the type of celebrities chosen and why they admired them, and the relationships imagined with these figures across the entire sample and by gender.

Adolescent girls' parasocial interactions with media figures.

We examined aspects of adolescent girls' parasocial interactions in the context of typical development. Parasocial interactions are defined as symbolic, one-sided quasi-interactions between a viewer and a media figure. In total, 107 adolescent girls were examined; 94% reported engaging in parasocial interactions to some degree.