What Is Miley Cyrus Parasocial Contact And Regret Theory?

Miley Cyrus & Parasocial Contact & Regret Theory

For this assignment I will listen to the song “Wrecking Ball” by Miley Cyrus and describe it in detail. I will then analyze the song with Parasocial Contact Hypothesis and Regret Theories in mind and find two factors that would predict why other people might choose to listen to “Wrecking Ball” by Miley Cyrus.

“Wrecking Ball” is pop ballad sung by the American recoding artist Miley Cyrus. Once known and adored by many as “Hannah Montana”, Cyrus shed her childish shell and adopted a sexualized and edgy persona for her fourth album, Bangerz, which “Wrecking Ball” is the album’s second single. The song starts with a quiet and minimalist synthesized keyboard instrumentation which is immediately met with the anguished vocals of Cyrus. Even in the first 30 seconds where only 26 words were sung, the topic of the song is quite evident: a failing relationship. Cyrus starts by crooning “We clawed, we chained our hearts in vain, we jumped never asking why, we kissed, I fell under your spell. A love no one could deny” which could be interpreted as two lovers fought to be together and succeeded in doing so but it was ultimately useless as denoted by “we chained our hearts in vain”. As the song progresses the minimalist keyboard continues creating an open environment in which Cyrus’ emotive vocals can shine. When the refrain is introduced Cyrus’ vocals and the keyboard instrumentation briefly disappear and when they reemerge they are joined with booming percussion that hits sharply, then slowly dissipates. Cyrus’ vocal delivery also changes from the softer, anguished sound to a powerful, almost vindictive roar which quickly returns to the soft delivery with a quiver as Cyrus sings “Yeah, you, yo...

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...y might have gotten had they made different decisions (Bleichrodt, Cillo, & Diecidue, 2010). People who have gone through or are experiencing a harrowing relationship will seek out media that touch on the subject, like “Wrecking Ball”. To determine how often the topic is brought up in the song you would only have to analyze the lyrics and count the phrases that would pertain to the topic such as; “I came in like a wrecking ball, I never hit so hard in love, All I wanted was to break your walls, All you ever did was wreck me, Yeah, you, you wreck me”. This variable correlates to the findings in the research performed by Robin Nabi and her colleagues. Nabi’s research found that those who had experienced a specific situation in which they may have felt regret, cheating, were more apt to choose media which depicted the situation. (Nabi, Finnerty, Domschke, & Hull, 2006)