Feels like Coming Home: Effects of Heimat Associations in Television Programs on Social Identity, Sense of Heimat, and Eudaimonic Entertainment Experience

Abstract

Television programs with an emphasis on regional and familiar aspects related to individuals’ cultural social identity can evoke Heimat associations and convey a sense of Heimat. Following a preliminary study (N = 100) to develop an instrument to measure the sense of Heimat, a first experiment (N = 169) found significant effects of Heimat associations in a television program on television viewers’ Heimat-related social identity and, in turn, their sense of Heimat and eudaimonic entertainment experience. A second experiment in another region with a different sample (N = 147) replicated these findings.