When TV and radio brought the voices and images of public figures into our very homes, we began to feel kinship with people we've never actually met. But these one-sided "parasocial" relationships have kicked into overdrive with the advent of social media. Now we subscribe to the daily minutia of YouTubers and Instagram influencers under the guise that this format is more honest — more "real" — than the scripted world of mass media. The bonds we feel across the Internet can be powerful and life-changing, but occasionally, unhealthy. Alli and Jen talk with Dr. Leslie Rasmussen, a professor of communications at Xavier University, who studies the intense psyschological phenomenon of parasocial relationships at a time where we are more connected and disconnected than ever.
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