Alive with Steve Burns

Episode: "You Grew Up With Me, But We Never Met"

Date: April 8, 2026
Host: Steve Burns
Guest: Dr. Rebecca Tukachinski Forster, media psychologist and professor at Chapman University

Episode Overview

This episode explores the concept of "parasocial relationships" — the emotional bonds formed between audiences and media personalities, like Steve Burns himself. The conversation asks: Are these relationships good for us? Are they real? Can they be harmful? Steve and Dr. Tukachinski Forster dissect the psychological mechanisms, the benefits and dangers, and the reality of these odd, one-sided connections that so many of us carry from childhood into adulthood — especially those who grew up with television “friends” like Steve.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

What Is a Parasocial Relationship?

• Definition and Mechanisms:
  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster explains:

    “Parasocial relationship is an imaginary relationship. It’s a feeling of intimacy and closeness with a media personality or someone we don’t actually know in real life, but we feel like we know them, usually through the media.” (04:38)

  • Parasocial interaction is the illusion of give-and-take between viewer and persona, a technique Steve habitually uses:

    “Every time when you look directly into the camera to maintain eye contact with the viewers, when you ask them questions and pause and wait…those create this feeling that he sees me back.” (05:14)

• Breaking the Fourth Wall: Essential in children’s television, and now in new media, to foster emotional bonds.

The Realness and Benefits of Parasocial Relationships

• Intimacy in Make-Believe:
  • Steve’s framing: “It’s feeling something is real in a shared space that is not. That’s the way I’ve always made it make sense to me…this is not real, but the feeling is real.” (06:25)
• Social and Emotional Role:
  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster notes:

    “There are numerous studies about the benefits of parasocial relationships…You were able to bring that caring adult figure into the living rooms of those children … and create a relationship with them through which they can learn.” (08:35)

  • Parasocial relationships help children learn, model good behavior, find comfort, and can even promote positive social attitudes in adults through identification with diverse characters/celebrities.
  • Media provides a “magic window” — allowing viewers to feel connection across social, cultural divides.

    “Media is that magic window that allows you to be friends with someone who is different from you.” (12:46)

Are There Dangers or Downsides?

• The Uneasy Illusion:
  • Steve’s concern: “I feel like I am perhaps inviting people to invest in an illusion, in something that is false in a way that is real. So that’s where I think there might be danger.” (19:11)
• Appropriate Suspension of Disbelief:
  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster: “Most adults can responsibly engage in suspension of disbelief. It’s not much different from going to a horror movie and experiencing genuine fear from something they know is not real.” (20:00)
  • Benefits include emotional support — even for adults.
  • Research shows writing or thinking about a favorite celebrity can boost mood or self-esteem, especially during rough patches.

    “That adults experience that too. There is research that shows how thinking about your favorite celebrity or writing a letter … has psychological boosts for you.” (21:01)

• When It Turns Unhealthy:
  • Famous outlier examples: celebrity stalkers, but these are rare and associated with underlying mental illness.
  • “It’s not that a normal parasocial relationship just becomes too intense…some people have mental health issues, and one way they manifest is in this way.” (22:49)
• Idealization & Unrealistic Expectations:
  • Steve reflects anxiously on fan comments like “You raised me” or “You are my safe space”:

    “None of those things are true…am I not doing harm by perpetuating that relationship?” (24:09)

  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster acknowledges “parasocial attachment” can be intense, even mimicking secure/insecure childhood attachment.
  • People blur fiction/reality boundaries even with obvious fictional characters—suggesting the brain’s tendency to emotionally connect is powerful.

    “Even when people look at fictional characters and actors, ... the characters that the actor plays influences how people perceive the actor's own personality ... it’s hard to maintain that distinction.” (25:03)

Do Parasocial Relationships Replace Real Ones?

• Not a Replacement, But a Supplement:
  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster: “People who form stronger, healthier relationships in real life are also more prone to developing parasocial relationships…It’s not a replacement for them. It’s a supplement.” (29:18)
  • They're most helpful to those without access to social connection (e.g., during lockdowns), but don’t generally make people less social.

    “If you are wired for social connection, you connect for real, and in the media. It’s not media instead of social; it’s in addition to it.” (31:00)

Romantic Parasocial Relationships & Role in Identity

• Origin and Function:
  • Parasocial crushes are common: “About 80% of Americans have had at least one parasocial romantic relationship in their life.” (33:53)
  • Stronger parasocial romantic attachment → more idealized beliefs about romance, which can impact satisfaction in real relationships (though causality is unclear).
  • These fantasies, while unrealistic, offer a safe ‘sandbox’ for self-discovery, especially in adolescence or after major life changes.

    “It is better for people to have this imaginary playground and kind of through imaginary play start figuring out who they are…” (37:46)

The Blurred Line: Fandom and Parasociality

• Difference between Fandom and Parasocial Relationship:
  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster: “Fandom is not necessarily about a persona…Not all fandom is parasocial relationship and not all parasocial relationship involve fandom.” (45:46)
  • Even within real personal relationships, there’s an imaginary component.

    “All of our relationships … have an imaginary component to them.” (42:16)

The “Other Side”: The Parasocial Object’s Experience

• Steve’s Confession:
  • Realizes he too is investing emotionally: “I am in a parasocial relationship with you every bit as much as you are in a parasocial relationship with me.” (47:00)
  • The act of disclosure (sharing personal stories, being vulnerable) fulfills his own needs for connection:

    “I don’t really have that kind of intimacy in my real life, you know. I mean, I’m doing it right now…” (50:27)

  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster notes this is understudied, but the experience of being the focus of so many imaginary relationships is psychologically complex.

Are We Friends? The Nature of the Connection

• The Big Question:
  • Dr. Tukachinski Forster: “It’s not real, but it feels real…it presses all the real buttons in your psychic. And it can have real effects, real effects on your attitudes, on your beliefs, on your mood, on your perception of self in very real ways.” (53:07)
• Endings Are Difficult:
  • When parasocial relationships end, it can feel like real grief, especially for children.

    “It comes with a sense of loss. It comes with profound sadness. It follows a lot of the same trajectories of grief that we experience in real life.” (54:15)

  • Steve reflects on people traumatized by his exit from “Blue’s Clues,” and his own loss when public rumor “killed off” his persona online.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Are you really my friend?” — Steve Burns opens the show, laying bare the central question. (00:00)
• “This connection has gotten much bigger and we're still doing it…don’t you ever wonder what it is we’re doing and how much of it is real?” — Steve Burns (02:44)
• “The health of the illusion depends on remembering that there is one.” — Steve Burns (57:45)
• “It’s not real, but it feels real.” — Dr. Tukachinski Forster (53:07)
• “We’re people who don’t know each other, choosing to treat each other as friends. And that’s good.” — Steve Burns’ closing reflection (58:30)
• “What if we treated the stranger simply as a friend we’ve not yet met? How might that change, like, everything?” — Steve’s optimistic final thought (59:15)

Key Timestamps

• 00:00-04:20 — Steve’s introduction and opening existential questions
• 04:20-08:35 — Defining parasocial relationships: mechanisms and origins
• 08:35-13:46 — Benefits for children and society at large
• 19:20-24:08 — Discussing the dangers and limitations, illusion vs. reality
• 29:18-32:05 — Do parasocial relationships replace real ones?
• 33:53-39:43 — Role of parasocial romantic relationships in adolescent and adult development
• 42:16-47:00 — Parasociality outside media, imaginary aspects in all relationships, and difference from fandom
• 47:00-53:07 — The "other side": Steve’s own emotional investment and experience as the object
• 53:07-55:03 — Are we friends? The answer: not really, but it is real in some ways
• 55:03-57:41 — Loss, grief, and the end of parasocial bonds

Tone & Style

• Reflective, vulnerable, and occasionally self-deprecating (Steve’s trademark gentle delivery)
• Intellectually rigorous, but accessible (Dr. Tukachinski Forster explaining research clearly)
• Empathetic and inviting — audience addressed warmly and treated as co-conspirators in wondering about life’s complications

Closing Reflection

Steve closes with a gentle but profound insight: these relationships, while not real friendships in the technical, mutual sense, are nonetheless meaningful. In a world rife with loneliness, perhaps treating strangers as friends we've just not met is a radical, empathetic act — the very spirit of what it means to be “Alive.”

For listeners: This episode offers deep insight into why a TV host from your childhood could feel like a real friend, and how, in many ways, that feeling is both healthier and more complicated than you might have guessed — for you, and for Steve.