IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbrese/v186y2025ics0148296324005289.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Fostering Parasocial Relationships with Virtual Influencers in the Uncanny Valley: Anthropomorphism, Autonomy, and a Multigroup Comparison

Author

Listed:
  • Liu, Fanjue
  • Wang, Rang

Abstract

The rise of virtual influencers has significantly transformed the dynamics of influencer-follower relationships. Integrating uncanny valley and parasocial relationship theories, in this study we construct and validate a model to delineate how the anthropomorphism of virtual influencers—characterized by humanness, attractiveness, and eeriness—affects the strength of parasocial relationships. Using survey data from 826 Instagram users, we reveal that this process is mediated by trustworthiness and wishful identification, with autonomy serving as a moderator that interacts with these anthropomorphism characteristics. We also examine variations in relationship development between existing followers and prospective followers, revealing that these two groups utilize distinct criteria to establish parasocial relationships with virtual influencers. Furthermore, we contribute to the ongoing debate on the uncanny valley phenomenon, showing that the relationship between virtual influencers’ anthropomorphism and perceived trustworthiness aligns more closely with a linear model than a curvilinear one. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Liu, Fanjue & Wang, Rang, 2025. "Fostering Parasocial Relationships with Virtual Influencers in the Uncanny Valley: Anthropomorphism, Autonomy, and a Multigroup Comparison," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:186:y:2025:i:c:s0148296324005289
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2024.115024
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148296324005289
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jbusres.2024.115024?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Przegalinska, Aleksandra & Ciechanowski, Leon & Stroz, Anna & Gloor, Peter & Mazurek, Grzegorz, 2019. "In bot we trust: A new methodology of chatbot performance measures," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 62(6), pages 785-797.
    2. Peng Hu & Yaobin Lu & Yeming Gong, 2021. "Dual humanness and trust in conversational AI : A person-centered approach," Post-Print hal-03598766, HAL.
    3. Seo Young Kim & Bernd H. Schmitt & Nadia M. Thalmann, 2019. "Eliza in the uncanny valley: anthropomorphizing consumer robots increases their perceived warmth but decreases liking," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 30(1), pages 1-12, March.
    4. Elodie de Boissieu & Patricia Baudier, 2023. "The perceived credibility of human-like social robots: virtual influencers in a luxury and multicultural context," Post-Print hal-04314353, HAL.
    5. Koles, Bernadett & Audrezet, Alice & Moulard, Julie Guidry & Ameen, Nisreen & McKenna, Brad, 2024. "The authentic virtual influencer: Authenticity manifestations in the metaverse," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
    6. Dabiran, Ehsan & Farivar, Samira & Wang, Fang & Grant, Gerald, 2024. "Virtually human: anthropomorphism in virtual influencer marketing," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    7. Kim, Do Yuon & Kim, Hye-Young, 2021. "Trust me, trust me not: A nuanced view of influencer marketing on social media," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 223-232.
    8. Liu, Fanjue & Lee, Yu-Hao, 2024. "Virtually responsible? Attribution of responsibility toward human vs. virtual influencers and the mediating role of mind perception," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    9. Conde, Rita & Casais, Beatriz, 2023. "Micro, macro and mega-influencers on instagram: The power of persuasion via the parasocial relationship," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    10. repec:hal:journl:hal-04808430 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Caleb Warren & Margaret C. Campbell, 2014. "What Makes Things Cool? How Autonomy Influences Perceived Coolness," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 41(2), pages 543-563.
    12. Fuller, Christie M. & Simmering, Marcia J. & Atinc, Guclu & Atinc, Yasemin & Babin, Barry J., 2016. "Common methods variance detection in business research," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(8), pages 3192-3198.
    13. Zhou, Qi & Li, Bin & Li, Huajun & Lei, Yueqiu, 2024. "Mere copycat? The effects of human versus human-like virtual influencers on brand endorsement effectiveness: A moderated serial-mediation model," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    14. Kim, Inhwa & Ki, Chung-Wha & Lee, Hyunhwan & Kim, Youn-Kyung, 2024. "Virtual influencer marketing: Evaluating the influence of virtual influencers’ form realism and behavioral realism on consumer ambivalence and marketing performance," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. You, Leping & Liu, Fanjue, 2024. "From virtual voices to real impact: Authenticity, altruism, and egoism in social advocacy by human and virtual influencers," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 207(C).
    2. Joel-Edgar, Sian & Chowdhury, Soumyadeb & Nagy, Peter & Ren, Shuang, 2025. "Virtual influencers in social media versus the metaverse: Mind Perception, blame judgements and brand trust," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    3. Guo, Zhiwei & Yang, Hongtao & Yang, Wang, 2025. "A new social media programme for brands? A study of the relationship between virtual influencers and brand followers," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    4. Wang, Bin & Han, Yao & Kandampully, Jay & Lu, Xiaoli, 2025. "How language arousal affects purchase intentions in online retailing? The role of virtual versus human influencers, language typicality, and trust," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    5. Benevento, Elisabetta & Aloini, Davide & Roma, Paolo & Bellino, Davide, 2025. "The impact of influencers on brand social network growth: Insights from new product launch events on Twitter," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    6. Gerrath, Maximilian H.E.E. & Olya, Hossein & Shah, Zahra & Li, Huaiyu, 2024. "Virtual influencers and pro-environmental causes: The roles of message warmth and trust in experts," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 175(C).
    7. Thompson, Jamie & Igarashi, Reika & Krowinska, Agata & Logan-McFarlane, Ashleigh, 2025. "Is it real or not? construction of meaning and identity in virtual influencer marketing," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    8. Deng, Guangkuan & Kang, Jiayi & He, Lijuan & Xu, Ying, 2025. "Endorsing alone or with humans: Investigating the impact of virtual influencers’ presentation formats on endorsement effectiveness," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    9. Deng, Fengyi & Tuo, Muyuan & Chen, Si & Zhang, Zichen, 2024. "Born for marketing? The effects of virtual versus human influencers on brand endorsement effectiveness: The role of advertising recognition," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    10. Rizzo, Cristian & Baima, Gabriele & Janovská, Kamila & Bresciani, Stefano, 2025. "Navigating the uncertainty path of virtual influencers: Empirical evidence through a cultural lens," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 210(C).
    11. Alnoor, Alhamzah & Abbas, Sammar & Khaw, Khai Wah & Muhsen, Yousif Raad & Chew, XinYing, 2024. "Unveiling the optimal configuration of impulsive buying behavior using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis and multi-criteria decision approach," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    12. Weiger, Welf H. & Giertz, Johann N. & Hammerschmidt, Maik & Hollebeek, Linda D., 2025. "Blurred lines? Disentangling the roles of consumers’ influencer- and brand engagement in shaping brand performance," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    13. Cheah, Chee Wei & Koay, Kian Yeik & Lim, Weng Marc, 2024. "Social media influencer over-endorsement: Implications from a moderated-mediation analysis," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    14. Kayeser Fatima, Johra & Khan, Md Irfanuzzaman & Bahmannia, Somayeh & Chatrath, Sarvjeet Kaur & Dale, Naomi F. & Johns, Raechel, 2024. "Rapport with a chatbot? The underlying role of anthropomorphism in socio-cognitive perceptions of rapport and e-word of mouth," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    15. Abhijit Guha & Timna Bressgott & Dhruv Grewal & Dominik Mahr & Martin Wetzels & Elisa Schweiger, 2023. "How artificiality and intelligence affect voice assistant evaluations," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 51(4), pages 843-866, July.
    16. Massilva Dekkal & Manon Arcand & Sandrine Prom Tep & Lova Rajaobelina & Line Ricard, 2024. "Factors affecting user trust and intention in adopting chatbots: the moderating role of technology anxiety in insurtech," Journal of Financial Services Marketing, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 29(3), pages 699-728, September.
    17. Guo, Rui & Wang, Yuchen, 2024. "Finding the best creation strategy: How influencer's photo-editing behavior affects consumer's engagement intention," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    18. Yao, Ruiqi & Qi, Guijie & Wu, Zhiqiang & Sun, Hua & Sheng, Dongfang, 2024. "Digital human calls you dear: How do customers respond to virtual streamers’ social-oriented language in e-commerce livestreaming? A stereotyping perspective," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    19. Yang, Defeng & Zhang, Jiaen & Sun, Yu & Huang, Zan, 2024. "Showing usage behavior or not? The effect of virtual influencers’ product usage behavior on consumers," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    20. Guerreiro, João & Loureiro, Sandra Maria Correia, 2023. "I am attracted to my Cool Smart Assistant! Analyzing Attachment-Aversion in AI-Human Relationships," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:186:y:2025:i:c:s0148296324005289. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jbusres .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.