Vicarious Identification and the Power of Indirect Experience

Developing a robust social identity and noticing connections between one’s social groups and sense of self are important aspects of personal growth. Social identification with in-groups can not only inform one’s worldviews and behaviors, but also afford opportunities to learn and grow vicariously through others. Vicarious experiences can span the breadth of human experience including pleasure, pride, embarrassment, shame, and trauma.

Vicarious identification is defined as “the way we appropriate the achievements and experiences of others to gain a sense of purpose, identity, and self-esteem”. Such emotional gratification can occur when watching astronauts succeed in space missions, reading about the exploits of colorful fictional characters, or witnessing the successes of a beloved sports team. Outcomes can also take a darker turn when motives or unconscious drives lead to harming others.

The following sections describe regions of the brain governing vicarious response, and explore positive and negative examples of vicarious living in the context of families and minority groups.

The Neurobiology of Vicarious Reward

The biological underpinnings of vicarious pleasure have been explored through a variety of experiments including televised games and financial competitions. In a 2009 study involving celebrating the achievements of strangers, researchers discovered greater activity in the ventral striatum and the ventral anterior cingulate cortex of participants who responded positively. These two brain regions modulated the intensity of vicarious reward when observing others’ successes and responding in a prosocial way.

Another study in 2017 found similar results when participants were asked to react to strangers experiencing financial windfalls or losses. The ventral striatum, which is a brain region below the cortex governing voluntary motor control and conscious processing of reward, showed higher activity. This part of the brain is linked to evaluating the importance of sensations, experiences, and objects in one’s surroundings.

A similar experiment in 2011 presented participants with a moderate sum of virtual money and asked them to choose between keeping it or giving it to a stranger. Researchers found strong responses in parts of the prefrontal cortex including the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and medial orbitofrontal cortex, especially when respondents chose to donate the money. These brain regions are involved in decision-making and evaluating choices when presented with potential rewards.

FAMILY AND INTIMATE RELATIONSHIPS

Vicarious Learning from Parents

One example of this phenomenon is vicarious identification with one’s older family members. Studies have found that intergenerational stories can greatly influence identity development for adolescents. As reference points for what constitutes worthwhile or undesirable life choices, familial role models can inspire reflection on one’s own life and goals. When informed by positive events and sustainable growth, these perspectives can motivate young people to craft similarly uplifting life stories and pursue the development of a healthy identity.

In some cases, children develop vicarious life stories that represent their understanding of how their role model lived. This vicarious narrative may or may not be identical to the actual life story of the person. For example, a 2020 study highlighting the influence of mothers revealed that children who held a positive narrative about their mother’s life were more likely to also hold a positive life story and sense of personal well-being. This makes sense given the powerful influence that nurturing, supportive mothers can have on one’s sense of self and confidence.

More specifically, research explains that vicarious identification with parents or role models allows young people to safely explore novel experiences, behaviors, and worldviews without pressure to integrate them immediately into their own identity. As their exploration of a parent’s attributes and actions continues, an individual can discern their own preferences and gradually adopt any desirable traits.

Vicariously Living through Children

There has been much discussion about the harm in parents vicariously living through the accomplishments of their children, and the repercussions on their childrens’ well-being. Such negative outcomes are closely tied to the pressures placed on young people to fulfill dreams that their parents did not or could not achieve. However, vicarious identification with one’s children does not have to be harmful.

For example, feeling joy in your children’s successes can be described as a vicarious experience. Vicarious joy is a prosocial response of joining in celebration of another person’s positive experiences. It is closely related to empathy, but with less focus on negative experiences. A 2020 study found that emotional closeness is the precursor for vicarious joy, and that intimacy mirrors the level of positive connections between parent and child.

The Devouring Mother Archetype

Swiss psychiatrist and founder of analytical psychoanalysis Carl Jung (1875-1961) explored harmful vicarious dynamics between mothers and their children. Through the lens of the anima, or the feminine qualities embedded in an individual’s personality, the mother archetype embodies both positive and negative traits. Her nurturing aspects include birthing, caregiving, and comforting her offspring. Her destructive side is called the devouring mother, who stunts her children’s psychological growth and blocks their development into individuated adults. Unconsciously or consciously, this mother effectively swallows her young. 

On a psychological level, devouring mothers are sacrificing their own personality through vicarious identification with another person. As Jung described, “First she gives birth to children, and from then on she clings to them, for without them she has no existence whatsoever. Driven by ruthless will to power and a fanatical insistence on their own maternal rights, they often succeed in annihilating no only their own personality but also the personal lives of their children”.

Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy

An extreme example of the devouring mother archetype is Münchausen syndrome by proxy. Now called factitious disorder imposed on another (FDIA), this phenomenon is a form of medical abuse inflicted by a caregiver. Perpetrators are typically mothers and victims are often young children. Signs of abuse include fabricating or inducing illness symptoms, manipulating test results, and excessive repeated injuries or hospitalizations. It is estimated that about 1,000 of the 2.5 million cases of child abuse reported annually in the United States are caused by FDIA.

Oftentimes maternal perpetrators were themselves victims of neglect or physical, emotional, or sexual abuse in childhood. In cases of neglect, sickness or injury might have been the only way to receive their caregiver’s attention. Personality disorders in mothers can also be a factor. Jung may have viewed Münchausen by proxy as the consequence of a devouring mother sublimating a distorted maternal impulse into the more socially acceptable role of attentive, sacrificing caregiver. The real-world impacts of this psychopathology are sobering, as the mortality rate for victims is close to 10% due to unnecessary and painful medical procedures.

Vicarious Joy in Relationships

An example of vicarious joy through one’s romantic partner is the phenomenon of compersion. Typically discussed in the context of consensually non-monogamous couples, compersion is an alternative to jealousy in response to a partner’s additional romantic relationships. It can be viewed as pleasure found in consensual provision of a valuable resource to a loved one. Experiencing feelings of warmth and satisfaction in knowing that your partner is having a meaningful experience is considered a “relationship ideal that is achieved through introspection, effortful thought, and consistent interpersonal communication among partners”.

SOCIAL INEQUALITY

Vicarious Contagion and Discrimination

Vicarious influences also stem from extra-familial groups. Social identification with an in-group is a survival-based instinct that naturally leads to homogenization of beliefs, attitudes, and even worldviews. Vicarious processes ensure that those who identify with a group naturally adopt the preferences and even emotions of other members. When one member demonstrates negative or unethical behavior, the others may justify their decisions due to having an emotional investment and psychological commitment to them. They may remain loyal and supportive even in the face of negative consequences.

Unfortunately, unethical behavior including discrimination and degradation of out-groups can quickly spread, causing other group members to also act unethically. A relevant example of this outcome involves the plight of minority racial groups, including individuals who are not directly targeted.

Vicarious Collective Trauma

While the traumatic consequences of discrimination on victims are widely discussed, the ripple effects on other minority group members are also important to explore. Vicarious or secondary trauma involves distressing experiences of prejudice and discrimination that happen to family members, close friends, and even strangers with whom one shares group ties. Witnessing interpersonal injustices takes a toll on observers and contributes to collective trauma.

Historically, violence toward vulnerable groups has led to chronic stress and contributed to transgenerational wounds that become part of group identity. On a day-to-day basis these fears can create anxiety and hypervigilance that take a toll on physical and mental health. Such generational transmission not only creates indelible scars on group consciousness regarding collective danger, but also impacts each individual’s feelings of safety in the world.

Vicarious Learning of Prosocial Behavior

Fortunately, vicarious identification with one’s in-group can also lead to positive beliefs and socially beneficial behaviors. Sometimes this positive contagion occurs through witnessing others’ moral choices and adopting similarly non-prejudiced attitudes through what is called vicarious moral licensing. Leaders often have this type of influence on followers who are emotionally invested in choice outcomes that inform the group’s well-being.

Indirect contact with out-groups can also increase openness and acceptance of others. For example, positive vicarious contact has been studied in school settings where children are indirectly exposed to unfamiliar individuals through stories and reading materials. For example, a 1999 study with Finnish students observed how reading stories about close friendships between Finnish teens and immigrant youth significantly improved attitudes toward foreigners. Such intergroup tolerance was a valuable finding given the increase in emigration to Finland at that time.

Another study in 2006 used stories about friendship between physically disabled and non-disabled British school children to effectively decrease prejudices and ignorance about the frequently stigmatized group. Through focusing on the commonalities among diverse story characters during story times and discussions, experimenters saw improvements in intentions to befriend children with disabilities.

Conclusion

Vicarious identification can be a powerful tool for learning and inspiration that positively impacts individuals and communities. It is a striking example of how relational humans are and how we continue to co-create our reality. However, in acknowledging the pitfalls of over-identification with others, psychologists remind us of the importance of individuation and the ability to cultivate one’s own opinions, goals, and identity.

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