Rooting for the Bad Guy in Netflix Shows. Empirically Investigating the Interplay between Identification, Moral Disengagement, Dark Character Preferences and SPS

IGEL2024
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#1

:speech_balloon: Speaker: Lena Weinrank @LenaW

:classical_building: Affiliation: RWTH Aachen

Title: Rooting for the Bad Guy in Netflix Shows. Empirically Investigating the Interplay between Identification, Moral Disengagement, Dark Character Preferences and SPS.

Abstract (long version below): In this study, I delved into the relations between individual differences across viewers (propensity to morally disengage, Machiavellianism, dark character preferences, and imaginative resistance) and identification with morally ambiguous characters through mechanisms of actual moral disengagement, while also pointing out their importance for character liking. I conducted a quantitative study (N = 83), in which I found that there are relations between individual differences, identification, and actual moral disengagement, but also within the individual differences (e.g. Machiavellianism and dark character preferences were positively correlated). Further, I investigated the activation of storyworld possible selves and found that present and feared SPSs were activated most frequently.


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:newspaper: Long abstract

To this date, a great number of studies has focused on the phenomenon of morally ambiguous characters (e.g. Janicke and Raney Modeling the Antihero Enjoyment; Sanders and Tsay-Vogel; Krakowiak and Tsay; Black et al.). With this thesis, I want to contribute to the existing line of research by providing an empirical investigation in which I try to outline associations between individual differences across viewers (propensity to morally disengage, Machiavellianism, dark character preferences, and imaginative resistance) and identification with morally ambiguous characters through mechanisms of actual moral disengagement, while also pointing out their importance for character liking.
To go beyond the objects of investigation of previous studies, I further introduce the activation of Storyworld Possible Selves (SPS) to this field of research. SPSs can be defined as blends between the reader, in this case the viewer, and the character (cf. Loi et al. 44). I distributed an online survey via SoSciSurvey (N = 83) in which viewers were confronted with scenes from Netflix’s famous show You. In this study, I collected data on their personality traits, as well as on their engagement with the morally ambiguous protagonist Joe Goldberg. I found that individual differences of Machiavellianism, dark character preferences, and the propensity to morally disengage are highly correlated and that dark character preferences are
strongly associated with both identification and actual moral disengagement. Further, in line
with a previous study (cf. Janicke and Raney Modeling the Antihero Enjoyment), character
liking was found to be predicted by actual moral disengagement and identification, whereby
the latter mediated the relation between actual moral disengagement and character liking.
The second focus was on SPSs. In regards to their activation, I found that present self SPSs and feared self SPSs were activated most frequently which partially contradicts general trends as proposed by Loi et al. (cf. 58). In sum, the study suggest that liking identification and actual moral disengagement are in fact predicted by individual differences and that they facilitate character liking. It also supports the assumption that the activation of SPSs depends on genres and the emergent situations that characters find themselves in (cf. ibid.).

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#2

I’ve learned a lot from your paper, thanks! I have a question related to your results pertaining to Story-World Possible Selves: I got your point that the mean scores were low, but still, how would you explain the relatively high scores for desired selves (I would expect scores closer to zero). Do your data allow to predict SPS scores using the other variables?

#3

Please excuse the late response. I was not aware of the notifications here on Concordance.

First of all, I absolutely agree with you and I also expected that the mean score for activation of desired self SPSs would be much lower, compared to the other SPSs. Concerning this relatively high mean score, I would like to refer to a passage by Jan Alber, who explains that, when reading fiction, the reader “assumes the identity of someone whose bodily appearance or psychological set-up is radically different from her or his own.” (Alber 2020: 63). Applied to my results, I could imagine that participants distanced themselves from the psychological set-up, but maybe, somehow, desired to possess the character’s bodily appearance. To me, this could explain why the scores are not extremely high, but neither drift too far apart from the mean scores of the other SPS activations.

With regards to your second question, I actually conducted some further analyses to see whether the other variables do predict SPS scores. Indeed, the combination of predictors (propensity to morally disengage, dark character preferences, Machiavellianism, imaginative resistance) had a significant effect on present self SPS activation, desired self SPS activation and feared self SPS activation. When I compared the standard estimates, I saw that Machiavellianism was the most significant predictor for desired self SPS activations. It predicted this activation negatively. My idea was that maybe, viewers with Machiavellian traits do not see a future version of themselves in Joe Goldberg, but rather a present version. Therefore, they do not wish to become like him, but rather see themselves as already being similar to the character. In this scenario, wishful identification, which is introduced as being closely tied to desired SPS blends by Loi et al. (2023: 58) would not apply, because there is no reason for viewers to wish for traits that they already possess.

These are just some ideas that came to my mind, but I hope that this helps to answer the questions a little bit.

I am looking forward to more discussions tomorrow!