Hello binge watchers, Julian here for DNews.

Thanks to online streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, and Discovery Go, it’s never been

easier to watch an episode of your favorite show.

And then another.

And then another.

And then it’s 4 am, seriously?

And while marathoning 3 seasons in one sitting may be awful for your circadian rhythm, it

may actually be beneficial, provided you’re not doing it alone.

A new study published in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships surveyed 259 college

students, asking them how much media they shared with their partner and how close they

felt to them.

The results showed that people who shared more media with their significant others were

more likely to report they felt closer and more committed to them.

That’s not particularly surprising; if you have shared interests, it’s easy to bond

over them.

But the survey also asked participants how many friends they shared with their partner,

leading to the most interesting insight.

Results showed that the fewer friends a couple had in common, the more impact sharing a favorite

show, movie, or book had on how close they felt to each other.

Lead author Sarah Gomillion proposed that this is because the characters in these shows,

movies, and books serve as substitutes for a common friends circle, compensating for

their lack of a social reality with a social fiction.

Interestingly, the desire to share other activities, like a dinner date, was unaffected by how

many friends the couple had in common, further suggesting that the characters in the movies,

shows or books were indeed serving as a replacement for a common friends group.

This makes sense when you look at past research that has found couples with common friends

feel more connected and committed, and that people tend to form emotional bonds with fictional

characters.

So a couple may feel the need to compensate when they have no friends in common, say because

they met through a dating app and one invited the other over for netflix and chill, and

before they knew it they were 5 seasons deep in Parks and Rec and chiller than Elsa.

So binge watching can make you feel like you have friends, but that’s not always a good

thing.

A 2015 study by doctoral students at the University of Texas at Austin found that people who were

lonely and depressed were more likely to binge watch television, which can cause them to

neglect their health or other relationships.

And if someone is neglecting their health and relationships, it stands to reason they’ll

become even more depressed and lonely, and eventually they’ll run out of episodes and

their TV friends will be gone.

Bonding with an actual human who sticks around after the series finale could be crucial to

avoiding this.

But what if your special someone is gone, and you miss your TV pals?

Is it alright to sneak in a few episodes without them?

What Gomillion’s study effectively means is when you get a few episodes of Thrones

ahead, you’re not just getting to the juicy bits first, you’re effectively hanging out

with all your partner’s friends without them!

Luckily someone has thought of a solution, and that someone is -- of all someones -- the

Italian ice cream maker Cornetto.

They’ve made what they call Commitment Rings, which sync to an app that will let you watch

shows and movies only when both rings are present.

So if you and your partner are working your way through Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and

The World’s End together, you can thank Cornetto for bringing you closer together.

Some couples may need to avoid their friends because their relationship’s a secret.

Seeker Stories has a story about dating in India And if you want to know about something

more scandalous that Netflix and chilling, check out guest host Ali’s ins and outs

of sending dirty pictures.

How do you get closer to your significant other?