The Meaning of a Television Serial for Teenagers: The Role of Identification, PSI, and Empathy.

This paper reports an exploratory focusgroup study among teenage viewers of the television serial Heartbreak High. It was guided by the following question: what meaning do teenagers attribute to a popular television serial, and what is the role of identification, empathy en parasocial interaction in this process? We deliberately combined elements of two different scientific traditions: Cultural studies theorizing about the active audience and media psychological theories about the ways in which audiences use media content. The analysis of the transcripts of our focusgroup sessions showed that the perceived realism of the serial was crucial in the construction of meaning. It also became clear that viewers indeed empathized with the characters, but identified with them in a limited sense. Parasocial interaction resulted in relationships with characters in the series, but this did not lead to feelings of friendship for the characters. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]