Research on fan psychology and behavior after idol "avatar room"
summary
This article discusses the psychology and behavior of fans after idols' "idol rooms" from the perspective of popular culture. Through persona theory, alienation theory, participatory culture, parasocial relationship theory and form survey, we fully discuss the behavior of fans behind the idol room and try to improve it.
Keywords idol room fans fans psychological behavior
1. Introduction
raising of questions
2021 is known as the first year of the "bedroom" in the mainland entertainment industry (hereinafter referred to as domestic entertainment). In January, Hua Chenyu and Zhang Bichen gave birth to a child out of wedlock, Zheng Shuang became a surrogate mother and committed tax evasion; in July, Wu Yifan was suspected of infringement and was arrested by Chaoyang police; in August: Huo After it was revealed that his personal life had broken down, Mr. Zhang retreated, and Zhang Zhehan was exposed that he participated in worshiping the Yasukuni Shrine. In December, Wang Leehom was exposed by his ex-wife for cheating on him multiple times during the marriage. In addition to the "role room" incident involving public morality and law, there have also been "kneeling room" incidents involving fire fighters in violation of professional rules in internal entertainment. For example, Ma Jiaqi, a member of the idol group Era Youth League, failed the college entrance examination with a score of 307. Idol group R1SE member Ren Hao has made inappropriate remarks on current hot topics many times, and Yu Shuxin, Liu Haocun, Zhou Keyu, Zhou Zhennan, etc. have been exposed as having old parents. According to incomplete statistics, in 2021 alone, there are 34 artists in the entertainment industry.
According to the WeChat public account "Prism", one week after Wu Yifan was arrested by the Beijing Chaoyang District Procuratorate on suspicion of rape, Aiman Data, which specializes in entertainment data monitoring and artist commercial value analysis, received more than 40 requests for artist risk background checks. of orders.
While the entertainment industry is turbulent and funds are in order to avoid risks, as consumers of celebrities, the fan group has invested a lot of money, lively emotions, digital labor, physical labor, etc. in the early stage, and the problem after the star's "corner room" has become more serious than that of the public. problem. After Wu Yifan was criminally detained by the Chaoyang police, fans on the Internet made complicated excuses, calling some of the information rumors, which was initially true, and regularly shared the artist's past performance information; at the same time, some fans chose to self-regulate after "couching" , "return to the pit" after a period of time, or unable to persist after "retreating from the pit", and finally "return to the pit". This series of behaviors is affected by many factors, thus affecting which theories fans are related to after "couching", and how these theories affect individual fans and the collective have yet to be discussed and analyzed.
(2) Research direction
1.Theoretical significance
The current research on fan culture and fan circles mainly focuses on the operating mechanism of fan circles, fans, fans' cultural consumption patterns and psychology, organization and standardization, idol worship and other economic aspects. Research on fan behavior after fandom is mainly based on performance. For its current situation, the behavior of fans is simply organized to reach the millennium. Studying this issue will help explore the current situation and deconstruction of celebrity fan circles, and supplement fans’ cognitive behavior and internal logic regarding the “Purple Room” incident.
2. Practical significance
Fully understanding fans' psychology and behavior towards idols after their idols' "idol rooms" will help the media, officials and other entities understand the reality, psychological problems and potential risks that fans face behind idol rooms, provide fans with correct guidance, and more Necessary protection should be done to promote the formation of healthy values in the fan group, so that fans can rationally view idol bedrooms, form psychological self-protection, and avoid excessive indoor consumption.
2. Literature review
(1) Personality worship and personality collapse
Regarding "personality design", Wang Qiannan proposed in 2018 that "personality design" is the setting of the character's image. It originally refers to the author's setting of characters, background appearance, characters, makeup, etc. in various original works, combined with the artist's personality According to the nature of some work, Liu Wu pointed out that characters are essentially real performances and representations of specific social roles, and this recognition must be in line with the public's moral principles. The so-called "Pillow Room" essentially strips away the conflict of social roles. The inconsistency between the "performer" and the virtual social role is mentioned, resulting in the failure of role play. Therefore, what Star Man sets is essentially a kind of role-playing with blurred boundaries.
Based on the above concepts, Li Jianwei proposed the fan psychology of idol rooms in 2018: When idols and people’s set behaviors do not match, fans will feel cheated and lost in the contrast. These behaviors of idols in the past will be labeled as behavioral in nature, and this collapse of the sense of faith will lead to disengagement and backlash. The speech pointed out the gap between fans when they discover the cracks in the character, and the relationship between the gap and the break in idol worship will be the focus of subsequent research.
(2) Fan participatory culture and alienation theory
Regarding the research on the diversity of fans in chasing stars, Zhang Xinyue pointed out in the 2022 study that an important part of the motivation for fan consumption is to compete among fans and create a good image of the fan group. This shows the economy of fans. In 1992, Jenkins pointed out in the book "Pirated Text Hunters" that fans of cultural products not only accept them unilaterally, but also create secondary creations based on personal understanding and communicate with other fans, which reflects the The spiritual talent of fans; with the development of new media and the emergence of celebrity new data media rankings, fan labor has added "digital labor" to increase traffic forwarding. Among them, the behavior of ranking is almost typical, which reflects the physical strength of fans. labor. To this point, more research has emerged on fans’ diverse devotion, but discussions on fans’ wishes are missing.
On the other hand, starting from the theory of alienation, Marx elaborated on the theory of alienated labor and the four forms of alienated labor in the "1884 Economic Manuscripts". Later, Frommt said that alienation is the loss of self due to the passionate pursuit of things. People are alienated when they give up self-preservation in pursuit of other things. So far, the alienation theory explains that people as subjects suffer from self-depletion due to excessive enthusiasm for objects.
In his 2020 research, Pang Haiyin explained the rationality of alienation explaining the fan circle, and proposed that fans have a high degree of identification and belonging due to their own behavior and self-movement, ignoring their other needs and sacrificing their superior feelings. At this time, the fans' emotional investment has already Alienation and idol worship can no longer fully guide fans' behavior. "Entertainment ethics", that is, exploring the possibilities that make one happy at all costs, have touched the hearts of fans.
Based on the above research, this study will explore how the alienation of fans after "Bedroom" is reflected.
(3) Parasocial relationship between idols and fans
Regarding the relationship between idols and fans, Horton proposed parasocial relationships in his 1956 study, that is, viewers establish a close relationship with themselves on TV characters. On this basis, Gretsch in 1997 incorporated the relationship behaviors imagined by the audience into the elements of social relationships. The above research identified the relationship between the two as an emotionally scarce factor. In the 2018 study, Gao Hanning once again mentioned the quasi-social relationship and proposed that the idol industry rationalizes this quasi-social relationship and idols take the initiative to develop "fan welfare" , once trained, the relationship between the two is gradually becoming benign, but the close state is weakening day by day.
3. Research design
This study takes fans who have experienced idol rooms as the survey subjects and conducts research around the topic of idol rooms. Explore the reasons behind their behavior, the time, money, and emotion that fans spend on idols, and the special emotional connection between fans and idols. The analysis unit of this study is individual fans who have experienced the Egypt House incident, focusing on their experience in the Egypt House incident. subsequent actions, causes and effects.
Regarding research methods, this study mainly used questionnaires, participant observation, and in-depth interviews to collect materials.
As far as the form survey method is concerned, the research plan uses the cluster radiation method to randomly select some small groups from the whole population, such as an idol who later announces some of his fans as the objects of form publication or form 1-2 Douban entertainment groups. Use the snowball contaminant method in the group at the same time to find other research objects that meet the requirements based on the existing research objects.
A total of 350 forms were collected in this pre-survey. Considering the nature of the pre-survey, in order to ensure the quality of filling in the form, this form has 13 questions, including 11 multiple-choice questions, 1 ranking question, and 1 fill-in-the-blank question to avoid too many, The quality of answers decreases due to excessive complexity. The form was developed in two Douban groups, and those who answered the questions were required to have "bed room" experience in advance to maximize the authenticity of the answers.
Through data analysis, the participants are mainly concentrated in the age group of 19-25, accounting for 71% of the participants, followed by those aged 15-18, and the number of participants between the ages of 26-30 are about 10% each.
4. No learning: the sense of gap caused by the nature of personality worship
Star idols are set as a social image, which expresses their own image and positioning, and is related to obtaining benefits. Therefore, star idols will strive to achieve perfect results in front of the masses. But when this kind of impression management fails, the appearance, moral quality, etc. are inconsistent with the previous image, and the personality of the star idol immediately collapses. What followed was fans' reaction to "The Couch Room".
First, regarding the emotional experience after working in the office, the researchers investigated the first feelings after working in the office.
It can be seen from the chart that the first emotion of the star in the mouse room is mainly shock, followed by anger, anger, resentment, calmness, contempt, etc. in the third place, and overall the second negative emotion is dominant. When there is a gap in the established image, in addition to the love and admiration set by people in the past, as well as the trust between idols and fans, the emotion generated at this time is "shock". The "acting" of the idol's setting is meticulous, but precisely because the idol's husband's behavior and personality details are very different from those who created the idol room, the contrast before and after the character's collapse behavior is heart-wrenching. After fans learned about their idol's husband's sexual behavior, they immediately felt emotions such as "angry" and "sadness". They recognized the existence of the idol's "acting" personality behavior and classified it as the idol's character of deceiving fans. The huge gap between idol personas and real idols makes fans feel punished.
Fans' sentiment increased significantly in the short term after the recent release. Some emotions are generated, which are mainly within the controllable range. At the same time, a small number of fans think it generates strong emotions. On the verge of losing control, there are also a small number of fans who think it is weak or generates a little emotion. At the same time, 9 fans said that they were basically out of control. In the short term, emotions can better reflect the emotional changes caused by the contrast between the persona and the idol. It can be seen that the first big blow to the fans of the idol idol room came from the disillusionment of the character, which started other behaviors of the fans after they were in the dormitory.
5. High costs: “East Asian” parental resentment
(1) Explanation of alienation theory
With the development of the fan economy, fans investing time and money into idols has become the basis for the existence and development of the idol industry. Fans purchase idol peripherals, tickets for performances, online subscriptions, etc., establishing a relationship between idols and fans as a commodity and commodity consumer. The survey results show that fans’ financial investment in idols is as follows.
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There are more people who spend less than 100 yuan, 100 yuan to 500 yuan, 500 yuan to 1000 yuan, and 1000 to 3000 yuan. The amount of fans' investment increases overall and the difference increases. At the same time, visual consumption has become a mainstream trend in fan culture. Fans may rarely invest part of their money in chasing stars. This also alienates fan consumption as a symbol to prove their loyalty, and encourages the money invested to be transformed into A bargaining chip that fans think idols should give back to.
When an idol is in an idol room, the money invested by the fan’s ex-wife is equivalent to the shackles used to kidnap the idol. In the study, 30 participants wrote "pay back the money" in the open question and answer. Fans believed that their early investment was like being "scammed", and believed that idols spent fans' money but committed unforgivable behaviors. At this time, fans' financial investment becomes a catalyst that makes the relationship between idols and fans more complicated.
Participatory Culture and Textual Poachers
As a participatory culture, star chasing emphasizes group participation, interaction and cooperation. Fans often participate in the topic of star chasing in online space as followers. Fans share idols’ character designs and materials on forums, social platforms, etc. Therefore, the link between fans and idols also includes fans’ secondary creations of idols.
In the announcement, after the idol idol room, the most voted fan behavior was "hesitant, composed of love and hate", followed closely by "comments related to losing followers on social platforms", and some fans said they would "lie on their backs" "Sit up" and so on. It can be seen that fan behavior is so complicated and not all The completion of the process is often accompanied by a turning point. Fans are personally involved in the star-chasing culture, and there must be programming that constitutes the idol text. Therefore, they have a deep connection with the idol and have rich experiences with the idol as a background. The function of participating in this culture enables fans to follow the idol. Behavioral presentation after house.
The researchers also investigated the reasons that triggered the above-mentioned fan behavior after Ike’s house. The researchers ranked the following options, and the comprehensive score indicates the level of the top-ranked options. Among them, the one with the highest overall score is "Ike's emotional return to stars". Participatory culture allows fans to deeply participate in the construction of idol culture, and the emotions for idols are very different from the behavior of high-ticket fans, which is "hesitant and composed of love and hate". degree of matching. The options with the highest comprehensive scores also include "the long pursuit time in front of the tatami room", "the time coordinate of building in front of the tatami room" and the "Manhattan coordinates of building in front of the tatami room". Several options constitute the image of fans who are deeply involved in idol culture, and are powerful The sense of participation has become the driving force behind fans’ behavior after going to the dormitory.
How fans who are immersed in participatory culture will choose their own star-chasing life after sleeping in the dormitory. In response to this question, the results of the celebrity vote are: nearly half of the celebrities believe that they have changed their views on celebrities and idols (such as pursuing humiliation, etc. ...), one-third of taxpayers believe that they no longer invest time and money, and one-third of celebrities believe that content about star chasing on social media is extremely silent. Answers such as reduced interest in chasing stars and no influence are also among the answers. It can be seen that after the idol statue room, fans are afraid of the next step into participatory culture. At the same time, because the idol room activities have shown a temporary indifference to star chasing activities, they are temporarily alienated from participatory idol culture.
6. Ethereal community: parasocial relationship
The relationship between fans and celebrity idols can be defined as a parasocial relationship, that is, an emotional attachment that the audience has to the creative figure, and the audience's fantasy of the relationship between the two. Idols and fans have no actual connection in life other than the audience and marketing figures, but there is another relationship between idols and themselves in the eyes of fans.
The survey results show that in terms of fan attributes, CP fans, Tianwei fans, and Annie fans account for 27.64%, 23.65%, and 10.26% respectively, ranking in the top three of all attributes. The first type of fans is the relationship between fans and celebrity idols. Bonding is milder, with the latter two categories having some kind of partnership, either imagining their star as a partner or imagining themselves with the star as a partner.
In the last open-ended Q&A, some of the interviewees’ answers were based on the language of parasocial relationships. As cp fans say " If you go gluten free again, I'm still willing to foot the bill" As for the straight man, he has a girlfriend who is secretly in love while selling sex with his colleagues, which really makes a living." Mom fans say that "you need soup to speak on the Internet" and clean up the black history regularly. Amateurs scold and no one will watch. Once famous, the world will know it. It will last forever. When you get older, you can't make the same mistakes again." It can be seen that when idols are in the statue room, fans can generally feel the pain of being a fan, and they will also have a variety of emotions based on the "worship" between themselves and their idols in social relationships.
7. Summary
Through research, it can be found that after a star idol becomes an idol, fans feel a sense of disparity due to the collapse of the idol's personality, and their emotions experience complex fluctuations. Most fans' emotions range from shock to anger and sadness, and their emotions are within a controllable range. With the investment of time and money, the idol room will cause fans to have more complex behaviors, such as forming love and hate, protecting stars, leaving silently, etc. In addition, the idol room will also affect fans' subsequent star-chasing life. After the idol room incident, fans' attitudes toward participatory idol culture or their behavior will change. The quasi-social relationship between idols and fans allows fans to conceive a variety of emotions based on fictitious relationships.
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