I know there are no right or wrong answers on a personality test. But is this right or wrong?
Blog Roll
- Best Week Ever
- BuzzSugar
- Coolfer
- Dark Horizons
- Deadline Hollywood Daily
- Digital Music News
- Gold Derby
- Hits Daily Double
- Hollywood Elsewhere
- Hollywood Wiretap
- Huffington Post
- Hypebot
- Idolator
- jaded insider
- Lost Remote
- Movie City News
- Movie List
- MTV News
- Pop Candy
- PopBytes
- Popeater
- reality blurred
- Salon: Arts & Entertainment
- Stereogum
- The Beat
- The Programming Insider
- Thompson on Hollywood
- Tuned In
- TV Barn
- TV Tattle
- TVFanatic.com
- TVNewser
- Velvet Rope
Featured Video
Realite: Reality TV justice!
Worthy winners on ''Runway,'' ''ANTM''; just desserts on ''Top Chef'' and ''SYTYCD''; bonus Kris Allen!
More 
Today's Most Popular
-
-
The Ausiello Files Ask Ausiello: Spoilers on 'Bones,' 'Glee,' 'Chuck,' 'Gossip Girl,' and more! -
-
-
Doc Jensen on 'Lost' 'Lost': Reboot anxiety?
From Our Partners
Special Coverage
'Twilight' Saga: 'New Moon'
It's almost here! Get all the latest news, photos, video, and fan commentary leading up to the big premiere
More
Comments (1-30) of 33 Add your comment
Know you are not alone!
The answer is obviously “personally involved with the characters.” At least that’s the case if the show is any good.
Also, someone please explain to me how you can be “personally uninvolved” with anything?
Why would I be watching otherwise?
I was visiting my parents when the House season finale aired and they actually got mad at me for crying hysterically and it turned into this whole thing about how could i be so committed to a TV show but not to real life etc…Some people just don’t understand.
I am personally uninvolved with my reality TV shows.
If your not involved why would you watch?
If it’s a GOOD show, it draws the viewer in and makes them have an emotional stake in the characters. The ability to empathize with others is what holds human society together, and drama has been a part of this since ancient times. So sue me for not being all dead inside!
Well, if you don’t feel personally involved with the characters, then it’s not a very good show.
It’s fine. Don’t even worry about. If you don’t feel personally involved with the characters then why are you watching the show, or TV for that matter, in the first place.
I definitely think that it’s perfectly normal to be utterly engrossed in TV characters’ lives, but then again… this is probably not the best forum to get a decent gauge of what’s “normal”. Us PopWatchers get pretty involved in all things pop culture. Not just TV.
You know, when I was a child, my father called the TV set “the idiot box”. It’s taken me about 30 years to realize it, but he was right! No wonder polls show that more and more Americans are uneducated! Look at the sh*t they choose to watch on television! “INVOLVED” or “UNINVOLVED” with TV characters??? I know people are dumb, I just can’t believe they’re THAT dumb!!!
So wait, NO ONE is going to point out where this question come from? It’s on the E_Harmony personality quiz.
Gretchen, I’d add you to my hotlist, but am already spoken for. Sorry!
So, if this is from e-harmony, does that mean you WANT someone that’s personally invovled with characters, because it means you can both watch great tv together, or does it mean that you/the other person will have unrealistic measurements for relationships?
I mean, no one is as sexy as David Boreanaz or as endearing as Emily VanCamp or as funny as Steve Carrell the first time you meet them. And no romance will be as epic as the epic romances on television (re: every show invented)…so? is this question a good or bad judge of a person?
“Well, if you don’t feel personally involved with the characters, then it’s not a very good show.”
Amen Raven_Moon!
You’re right, Eric Friedmann. This world would be a much better place when we all aim to be condescending snobs like you.
Seriously though, there’s nothing wrong with being personally involved in any bit of media. Books, movies, sports and music find ways to tug heartstrings if it’s developed well enough. Why should TV dramas be any different? Even some reality TV gets me worked up; the most recent example being Erik on Survivor handing over his immunity necklace. I kept pacing back and forth in the room while I had a migraine, yelling at the TV screen, “WTF are you doing?!”
I don’t think it’s that bad being less attached to real world tragedies, because getting too emotionally involved in the regular atrocities that happens on a daily basis is enough to make anyone crawl under the bed in the fetal position.
Frak you, Eric Friedmann! Now, I don’t want to boast about the fact that I’ll be doing my masters at an Ivy League school come Fall…. Oh wait, guess I just did
So I will get as involved with television characters as much as I damn please!
Although, I am Canadian so I don’t know if your statistics apply to me, but still I figured it was worth a shot
its the mark of a great show if you become personally involved. & meg, you were not alone in crying during the house season finale. both my mom & i did.
It’s fine. There are those in the “It’s only a show” camp and others who have lots of imagination/empathy to get fully involved in the show and characters. If this is an MBTI questionnaire, this question helps determine whether you are more of a thinker or a feeler. (Not that feelers don’t think and thinkers don’t feel, of course.)
Huh? What does personally involved mean? Simulating “real” conversations with them? A pretty bizarre question in the first place.
I guess you do get involved if you know what it means. I supposed it could be watching a horror movie and yelling at the screen “Don’t go in the shower, you moron!” but also feeling sad when watching a sad part of the movie, or something like that.
Sure I am involved-who is the final cylon?
Agreed, if you are not invested in a show and it’s characters why watch?
But Kate, I don’t think emotionally responding to a show is the same thing. You emotionally respond (if you are even partially human) to a variety of things – great books, art, etc. This question, at least how it’s worded, just seems freaky.
Eric Friedmann (get it?) is the fifth Cylon.
t3hdow, every time I read one of your infantile, lame comebacks to my comments, you convince me…yes, some people ARE that dumb!
I think there’s a real difference between interested and “involved”. When I was younger, yes, I was “interested” in who shot J.R. (Dallas) and who killed Laura Palmer (Twin Peaks). I wasn’t, however, emotionally “involved” with characters from television to the point of being ridiculous. Some people obviously allow themselves to reach that level. Sad.
Boy, the next thing you know, the vice president of the U.S. will criticize Murphy Brown as if she’s a real-life person.
Oh, wait…
It is 100% human nature to seek out emotional connections. Since the dawn of civilization, all forms of entertainment play on that need, & there is nothing wrong with that. To me, when you become ‘personally involved’ with a character, it just means that you can relate to the point where you care what happens. It’s a measure of your willingness/ability to empathize, to imagine yourself in the situation you’re viewing/reading. I have no shame that that’s me! I feel ‘personally involved’ with life in general,& I can easily let that carry over to the page/screen/theater. True, these days there is a lot of crap out there, & such a glut of entertainment outlets it’s possible to let it take you too far but the vast majority of us merely have an emotional experience,then come back to reality & continue to be productive citizens. So to all you Eric Friedmanns out there – lighten up. Getting involved is just for fun. To me a worse character trait is to be overly judgmental of others.
Involved with characters in Television shows, books and movies. I am firmly grounded in fiction and prefer it there!
My issue? The whole thing is phrased poorly. “Involved” can be interpreted a number of ways, as shown by the responses here. Doesn’t leave me impressed with eHarmony.
Come on, Eric F. You can’t be surprised that people are annoyed with your (numerous) condescending comments about your distaste for television. It’s also kind of silly to make vague references to imaginary ‘polls’ that prove Americans are getting dumber by the day. We GET it. We like tv and you don’t. I’m not sure what you’re trying to prove.
This is not wrong at all. All forms of performance have always asked the audience to engage and get caught up in what they’re watching. That is the whole reason Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht created the concept of “alienation”, so that the audience would separate themselves emotionally from the story and see the ideas and points that were being made.