I’ve often wondered what my usual comfort watches – The Thick of It, Ugly Betty, Blackadder, Derry Girls, Peep Show – say about me (aside from the fact that I had most of them on DVD as a teen).
I mean, they’re not all soothing, are they? A screaming Malcolm Tucker isn’t exactly what springs to mind when you picture a relaxing rewatch.
But according to the “social surrogacy” theory, the shows we come back to time and time again might offer a type of comfort that isn’t as straightforward as gentle voiceovers or calming scenes.
According to research published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, the one-sided relationships we form with the people in our beloved episodes can “provide the experience of belonging”.
What is “social surrogacy”?
The hypothesis suggests that when people aren’t getting their social needs met in real life for whatever reason, they might turn to music, books, and TV shows to “belong”.
In this paper, the researchers ran four studies to support that theory in the case of television series.
The first one showed that people were likelier to turn to their favourite shows when they felt lonely, and that starting yet another binge-watch of their beloved programmes lessened that feeling of isolation.
The second study suggested that people might talk more, and in greater detail, about their favourite TV shows when they feel left out or rejected.
Study three, meanwhile, demonstrated that thinking about series we adore “buffers against drops in self-esteem and mood and against increases in feelings of rejection commonly elicited by threats to close relationships”.
And lastly, the final experiment revealed that keeping our comfort watch in mind might make people less likely to think about being lonely or feel lonely.
Notably, watching TV in general didn’t seem to give people these results. Only the shows they already had a relationship with seemed to offer these effects.
This, the researchers concluded, might mean “seemingly asocial human technologies, such as television, can actually serve a social function”.
Wait – does that mean there’s something wrong with rewatching your favourite shows?
Not at all. The study authors checked for levels of self-esteem, the need to belong, and attachment style among participants (previous research had hinted that these factors might make someone more likely to seek “social surrogates”).
They found that these qualities didn’t seem to make a difference in the effect familiar TV had on belonging at all in their studies, though – “the results of these analyses suggest that social surrogacy does not appear limited to just one gender or to ‘insecure’ or ‘maladjusted’ individuals”.
The research also reads, “Television programming, particularly reliably-followed favourite programs, allows viewers the opportunity, week after week (or even day after day), to regularly immerse themselves in a narrative about a recognisable ’social’ world in which familiar people, situations, landscapes, and events become intimate and comfortable”.
That cosy feeling of belonging can bring us back to our faves, over and over.
