Parasocial Signaling
you've never met them, but acting like you have is the flex
Grounded in the research on Horton & Wohl, 'Mass Communication and Para-Social Interaction' (1956); applied to status signaling via Wikipedia: Parasocial interaction
the move
parasocial signaling is using a one-sided relationship with someone famous as your status flex. you've never met the creator, athlete, founder or artist — but you talk about them like a close friend, quote their lore, wear their merch, claim their taste as proof of yours. the relationship is fake-intimate by design. the signal is real: you're telling a room which tribe and tier you belong to.
the first effect
the term comes from Horton and Wohl's 1956 paper coining 'para-social interaction' — they watched TV viewers form real-feeling bonds with hosts who'd never know they existed. that part's solid academic ground. the 'signaling' twist is a newer popularizer's framing, so hold it loosely. but it sits on Veblen-style status logic: any taste you flash is a flag, and a famous person's name is just a louder, pre-branded flag to wave.