When people get triggered online and how to respond to yours
Understanding triggers in parasocial interactions
This is a follow up piece on how to tell if triggers are keeping you stuck in drama and how to critically analyse your reaction and modify your response.
Social networking using social media platforms is a common way we connect with people today.
I’ve acquired a number of different types of connections through engaging and posting educational, insight provoking and thought stimulating content on different platforms (like this one). These connections have led to friendships, collaborations, business and professional development opportunities, various levels of acquaintanceship and transactional relationships.
Some content creators gradually become influencers who develop a large fanbase or following that can lead to a parasocial relationship; people forming intense, one-sided attachments to celebrities, influencers or public figures.
I’m going to focus on the grey area between transactional and parasocial relationships - parasocial interactions.
Social media introduces additional opportunities for parasocial relationships to intensify because it provides more opportunities for intimate, reciprocal, and frequent interactions between the user and persona. These virtual interactions may involve commenting, following, liking, or direct messaging. The consistency in which the persona appears could also lead to a more intimate perception in the eyes of the user.
Anyone active on social media with a following is familiar with parasocial interactions and will have experienced the “lovebombing to devalued” phenomenon. I’m going to discuss what happens when a fan suddenly becomes an ex-fan of your ideas.
Here’s a typical scenario…
A person comes across a creator’s content on a social (audio) platform and feel an instant resonance with it. They feel like the creator is speaking to their experience without knowing them at all and begin following to see more of the creator’s work. They have notifications turned on and respond instantly with enthusiastic and supportive messages comments, often with 🙏 and 💯. The person sometimes shares how the post resonates with their own experiences and provides details that can cross into oversharing. They share/retweet/repost the content with their own networks and will also defend the creator’s posts against negative comments. The person appears to wholeheartedly trust the information the creator shares and is even willing to go into battle with internet strangers to protect the creator. They are loyal fans and advocates for the creator’s work.
This is what content creators want, right?