Reflexivity, Conformity, and Israeli Big Brother

This article examines how regular viewers of the reality program Big Brother interpret the program in Israel. The findings of the study reveal that viewers emphasize the formal characteristics of the program stimulate them in a way that other reality programs do not. The interviewees report the program influences them in three ways: excessive preoccupation about personal reflexivity (talking with the televisual other), an experience of inundation, and the development of a new desire: "the desire to be discovered." These three influences connect personal reflexivity to, inter alia, actions aligned with social control and the ideal-cultural self, which are at the foundation of psychological and neoliberal discourses.