Love Bombing Communication Style on Instagram among Generation Z in Medan City
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.55927/jsih.v5i2.17Keywords:
Love Bombing, Communication Style, Instagram, Generation ZAbstract
This study examines love bombing communication styles on Instagram among Generation Z in Medan City. Using a descriptive qualitative approach, data were collected through in-depth interviews, non-participant observation, documentation, and source triangulation involving five Generation Z informants who had experienced love bombing in romantic relationships. The findings show that perpetrators do not employ a single communication style, but strategically shift among the Dynamic Style, Equalitarian Style, Controlling Style, and Withdrawal Style. Instagram features such as direct messages, stories, likes, replies, and blocking facilitate rapid intimacy, emotional validation, surveillance, and communication withdrawal among young users. The love bombing process develops through three stages: idealization, devaluation, and discarding, followed in several cases by hoovering through repeated digital contact in online spaces. The study concludes that love bombing is not merely excessive romantic attention, but a manipulative form of digital interpersonal communication that transforms affection into emotional control and weakens victims’ relational boundaries.
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