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2014 Abstracts

A Novel Romance: Parasocial Interaction, Attachment Style, and Jealousy in female readers’ romantic relationships

Emma Josey, Dixie State University

Communications

Romance novels seem to be a staple in the devoted reader’s array of books and have remained an extremely popular genre throughout the centuries. Not only are the actual stories appealing to the readers, but some readers go a step further and interact with or create a relationship with characters themselves. A phenomenon called parasocial interaction. This research study seeks to discover if the parasocial interactions female romance novel readers experience relate to a practice of a particular attachment style and jealousy in their romantic relationships. These characteristics are important to the health and sustainability of people’s romantic relationships, and this study seeks to learn whether or not the quasi relationships romance novel readers create with characters influences those relationships.