1. Introduction

Fans group have a strong cultural influence in the Internet era. Nowadays, most teenagers worldwide have experienced the process of "star-chasing". The crazy growth of the fans group base, it has a huge impact on the whole society. Cases such as "Fans rescue during Wuhan epidemic". Fans raised money spontaneously to support the Wuhan epidemic which fully illustrate the profound impact of fans on social life. However at the same time, "Sean Xiao’s fans report AO3", because these fans believe that many of the derivative works on AO3 site infringe on Sean Xiao's right of reputation. This incident turned into a massive war of words between fans and users of AO3. So how to correctly manage and guide fans is an important task, but firstly, Fan groups need to be better understood and researched. Before, many scholars in western countries were the first to conduct in-depth analysis on fans, but with the change of times, many theories are not strongly applicable in today's world. Therefore, this paper will not only trace back the origin, the causes of fans, the characteristics and influence of fans, fans of economy these three aspects of research, but also will combine these analysis with the information and comments on the Internet.

2. Literature Review

Researchers have conducted in-depth studies on fans and their groups and found that some classical theories can explain most of the psychological mechanisms of fans.

2.1. Characteristics of Fans and Fans Groups

There is no doubt that the group of fans is one of the most active groups in today's Internet age. However, the definition of fans has not been clear enough . In a narrow sense, being a fan can mean that they have extraordinary passions for some object (including people, religions, teams, ideas, brands). Throne and Bruner thought: "Their behavior may be considered unconventional by others but does not violate common but societal ethical norms.” Compared to former fans, today's fans are more emotionally expressive of "crazy," more organized in their support, more reproducible, and more robust in their identity. [1]. Once fans gather to form a tight group, a distinctive culture which we called fan culture emerges. Fiske [2]. pointed out in his book Understanding Popular Culture that fan behavior is active, participatory and fanatical, all belonging to the domain of interlinked network subculture. Fans culture can be classified as a Youth subculture, the additional culture form established by stylization and other symbols by the challenging dominant culture. It reflects the peculiar characteristics of the youngsters’ rebellion, conflict, difference as well as their confusion on identity.In addition, the fans and the derived fan culture studied in this paper refer to the core fans, which are active in fan groups.

2.2. The Psychological Mechanism of Idol Worship

There are different opinions about the psychological mechanism of this intense"idol worship". From the psychological perspective, Freud's psychoanalysis theory says that idol worship of teenagers is the impulse transfer of desire, seeking emotional support and identification of objects. [3]. Lacan's "mirror image theory" [4]. , which developed based on Freud's "projection theory", is also one of the commonly used theories to explain fan identity. According to the book History and System of Western Psychology, Lacan's "mirror stage" refers to the pre-Oedipus period about 6-18 months after the birth of an infant, who sees the sight of looking into a mirror as a metaphor for one (infant) discovering the oneness of the self in the other (image). That is, fans not only actively seek out similarities between themselves and they are beloved, but also project their physical characteristics, personal experiences, and values onto their beloved. By strongly identifying with a celebrity, fans find a strategy to obtain psychological satisfaction without being really famous, truly touch the "mirror self", and realize the construction of self-identity. The psychological mechanism of mirror image and projection explains processes of fan identification: self-extension to some others; From the perspective of Klein's self-theory, fans devote themselves to projecting their idols, that is, the "good object" they identify with, into their self-ideal and finally integrate with it. Some scholars also understand this mechanism as "it not only calls for the emotional resonance of the viewer and the projection of youth experience but also opens an empathic text for the youth subject's confusion, struggle and imperfection of self-realization in reality" .

2.3. The Psychological Mechanism of Fans Group

As for how fans develop this assertive, irrational following behavior. It needs to analyze both micro fans' psychology and macro-social effects. The perspective of micro fans’ psychology is introduced at foregoing part. And from a micro point of view, the theory of identity was first proposed by Tajfel and Tunner in the 1970s [5]. , in which an individual realizes that he belongs to a specific group and at the same time recognizes the emotional and value significance brought to him by being a member of the group. Tajfel also proposed the three concepts of "generalization, identification and comparison", emphasizing the connection between people's sense of belonging to a group, group identification and comparison between groups. Meanwhile, Michael A.Hogg and Dominic Abrams [6]. also divided the process of social identification into self-categorization and social comparison. One thing is for sure is that a large part of what makes a fan base so cohesive is the strong identity it engendered. But the psychological mechanism of fans is far more complex than that. From the perspective of social relationship, core members of a fan group tend to have greatly influence on other individual fans. Bibb Latane's“social influence theory”says: "The total amount of social influence from others in a particular situation (their social influence) depends on three factors: The number, power, and proximity of influencers." Among them, the strength of influencers is related to their social status, the power they have and whether they are experts. When the number of influencers in a group is dominant, the strength of influencers is enough to guide other members of the group, and the behaviour of influencers is closely related to the interests of members, the behaviour and attitude of individuals in the group will be influenced by them, and remain consistent with them or remain silent.

It is necessary to link individual psychology with social relations to study the psychological mechanism of fans. Randall Collins, put forward the theory of "interaction ritual chains" based on “Goffman’s symbolic interactionism”[7]. and Durkheim’s “theory of the Division of Labor in Society” [8]. For social organizations, interaction and ritual can constantly generate emotional energy and connect such emotions with symbols, thus forming the foundation of organizational beliefs, organizational thoughts, organizational moral norms and organizational culture. In the theory of "interaction ritual chains" [9]. , two or more people are required to gather in the same place and perceive each other' s presence, but the development of Internet media today makes up for the defect of "physical absence" and virtual online participants replace physical online. Therefore, in the era of the rapid development of the Internet, the base of fans has risen substantially, forming a huge fan group, thus spawning a unique and distinctive "fans culture".

2.4. Style, Resistance, Incorporation

As a unique representative of subculture, fans culture has brought extensive and far-reaching influence. From the theoretical analysis of Birmingham School, fans culture, as a kind of youth subculture, has a strong "style". [10]. That is the means by which cultural identity and social orientation can be negotiated and expressed. Style is not only a symbolic game of subculture groups, but also shows concerns and conveys class, race, gender and other relations. Meanwhile, fans culture also brings a intense “resistance”, an "imaginary relationship" with the real-life situations in which they live. Once this“resistance” style came into being, the dominant culture and interest groups made unremitting efforts to contain and incorporate the subculture.

In summary, previous studies mainly analyzed the psychological mechanism of fans from micro and macro levels.These theoretical systems explain the psychological mechanism of fans in a systematic and professional way, but there are some phenomena that do not completely match the fans in the current Internet era. This paper will use these theories to combine and interpret the performance and influence of today's fans and their groups.

3. Discussion

3.1. The Psychological Mechanism of Individual Fans

3.1.1. Psychological Projection and Mirror

What is the psychological motivation for fans to have such strong and irrational favorable feelings towards their idols? A fan said on Weibo: "Star-chasing is not losing your life. It is getting better and better with your beloved idols." There are many fans in such a state of mind to view their star-chasing behavior. We can explain it in Lacan's "Mirror Stage" based on Freud's theory of the "projection theory" , which refers to turning any situational consciousness that is confused with reality and imagination into a mirror image experience. Mirror image can be understood as one's imagination or fantasy of others, which will be transformed into one's own "psychological image" and has become there is subject in time after strong identification. When fans fall in love with their idols, they often pursue an idealized self and have a strong sense of identity with idols as "objects" to project it onto the “subject”. Projection is subconscious. Marie-Louise von Franz summarized Freud's "projection" as : "Projection is a tendency to see the uniqueness of behavior and behavior pattern in others, and we ourselves also show these uniqueness and behavior pattern,but we are not aware of it.”

Idol, as an eye-catching, attractive external presence, has become the realistic carrier of these subconscious minds. At the same time, most fans tend to have a strong empathy with their idols, which may be because there is a certain similarity between "self" and "ideal". Fans cheer their idols' success and grieve their idols' setbacks, which is an emotional fluctuation of expectation and disappointment for the "idealized self". To put it simply, some fans' empathy for their idols is essentially a kind of "self-touching".

Some bloggers says :"I said that in my next life it would be great to look like Dilraba for 10 seconds, and it would be gorgeous to look like her!" Stars often have superior facial features and figures, which attract and make viewers have strong feelings of admiration. In the case of recognition of the star's appearance level, the mirror experience is transferred to the imagined self to achieve their self-appearance satisfaction in the fantasy. However, appearance does not represent all "idealized self", and it often needs strong personality charm and spiritual characteristics to create a complete character image. So fans look for the stars to identify with their good qualities. One Dilraba’s fan has said :"Someone you like must have something in common with you, for example, Dilraba’s fans and Dilraba are most similar to each other because they all have the passion of a young protagonist in the comics - No matter what the situation is, it is so honest and bright; No matter what the result is, we should do our best; We have been hurt, but we always have courage and uprightness."

The fans will aggregate the good qualities of their idols in front of the screen, which is the part idols show, and project them onto themselves, to reflect on their idealized personality.

Fans who project their idols onto themselves do not confound "object" and "subject" in objective reality. A fan has said:"Learn to cherish dear Dilraba’s role and efforts, learn to operate and maintain the super atmosphere of following the drama, learn to reject all negative energy, and promote Reba's works with my greatest enthusiasm and sincerity ... Whether Dilraba himself or her fans, such sincerity is always moving."

The fan is more of a close pursuit of an idealization than a daze to become a mirror image of the perfect ideal self. Basically, idol and fans’ ideal self will not be a complete mixture, but a relatively clear separation of subject and object.

3.1.2. Sexual Instinct, Libido and Fantasy

Freud believes that human nature is a kind of unconscious primitive impulse and instinctive desire, which only pursues happiness and satisfaction, among which the most important is sexual desire and attack desire. Lust, also called “Libido”, is an innate instinct of life. Naturally, many fans have strong "Libido" for their idols. In Freud's “sexual instinct theory”[11]. , Libido refers to “human sexual instinct in a narrow sense and pleasure caused by human body, appearance, appearance and organs in a broad sense". The effect of Libido is solid and extensive, so today's cultural industry keenly captures this point and fully introduces "sexy stars" in the market to arouse fans' instinctive pleasure and desire.

Wu Weihua puts forward: "The level of appearance and physical performance of idol is the origin of love and pursuit, and the power of youth and fans. The body of the ignorant idol is visualized, materialized and even idealized ". Sexual charm has always been a direct source of pleasure for fans. On the Internet 2.0 era, netizens are more in pursuit of rapid stimulation. Moreover, striking appearance and figure naturally can bring more exciting "pleasure to audience". Many economical companies saw business opportunities and launched entertainment stars with distinct visual charm in this context. Taking the image of the body as a selling point greatly stimulated the interest and pleasure of fans and generated strong aesthetic pleasure.

The "desire" of fans for idols is not limited just in "sexual desire". Popular labels such as "national wife" and "cute boyfriend" express fans' desire to pursue love, romance relationship and other feelings. Many fans use it as a "substitute" for real emotions. "Who can refuse Yang Yang's love? dream has been thinking about how to marry Yang Yang!" Placing the emotional desire on the idol is an unconscious behavior based on the pleasure principle and accompanied by a strong impulse to establish a personal connection with the idol. Hence the craze for "sasaeng fans", who take pictures of celebrities' out of official camera, harass their favorite idols, and influence the private lives of idols (and their families).One of anonymous user have said :"Most of the sasaeng fans just want to see things completely different from ordinary fans,","Half of the love idols I've followed myself are not because I like listening to their songs or watching them perform on stage, but because I am voyeuristic. Most of the sasaeng fans I know are the same."

These fans want to watch their idols' real life because their idols only show part of it in front of the camera, and sasaeng fans are not satisfied with their fantasy through these parts, so they have a fantasy-driven connection with the idols’“real life”. The tension of bridging the gap between fantasy and reality drives some fans to make "sasaeng fans". Bur also, most fans are driven by their intense fantasy to chase stars. "It must have been a long and hard journey to see Cai Xukun. He just looked at you, and your eyes have tears. He sees a group of people, you only see him. He did not say I love you, but you said I do."

These fans can be seen fantasizing about meeting Cai Xukun in real life. The difference between private fans and ordinary fans may be whether they have paid actual actions, but it is certain that fans often take a subjective way to construct a three-dimensional idol, and try to connect with the reality on their own.

3.1.3. Summary

Whether it is emotional projection or desire and fantasy, it is inevitable that contemporary fans attach great importance to their inner experience and realize their idealized value by their idols' appearance or personality charm, or develop fantasies to satisfy their desires. The cultural industry has deeply seized this fanatical and irrational strong emotion. In the Internet era, when the star-making industry is extremely developed, the idol stars with eye-catching and exquisite appearances, characteristic personalities and easy to meet the public aesthetic and Libido have been mass-produced, catering to the psychological characteristics of contemporary fans.

3.2. The Psychological Mechanism of Fan Groups

Benedict Anderson [12]. introduced the concept of "imaginary communities" as a description of groups. “First, the members of this community are mostly scattered, but they are able to 'imagine' a whole through various media that binds them together. Second, the body of the imagination is bounded. Third, an 'imagined community' is an imagined internally“community” that people will think that is equal, even though in real life inequality tends to dominate society.”

To some extent, the fan groups also belong to an imaginary community. Nowadays, with the development of network technology, a large number of virtual communities have emerged based on network society, and fan groups, as one of the most eye-catching communities, have a great impact on the network society. They posted posts about their idols on Weibo and other social platforms, praised them and strongly recommended them to netizens. They also participated in fierce group activities, such as "Make a List" from time to time. And belong to the same idol fans often have a lot of interactive communication, at the same time, the core of fans will use must have the exclusivity of language to convey information about the icon. Via the Internet between fans and fans formed a relatively close group, restricted by the common rules and guidance.

3.2.1. Identity Characteristics of Virtual Identity

The identity of fans is not only the real identity in the whole society but also refers to the virtual identity in cyberspace. By setting various kinds of information on the platform, such as the profile picture, ID, personality signature and other embedded information about the idol, the fans can clearly show the virtual network identity of certain fans. The vast majority of publicly disclosed fans use photos of their idols as profile pictures on public social media such as Weibo. On the one hand, it comes from "Because she is beautiful, I will change my profile picture". On the other hand, "changing the profile picture will let everyone know that I am a Dilraba’s fan, also want to show their 'fan registration' (similar to the account in the fan circle)." Fans are particularly concerned about this virtual identity. The home page of social media clearly shows their own preferences and interests, and serves as an "id card" of the virtual community, which can be used to prove the "virtual identity" of fans.

If people get inside the core of fan groups, they often find a very organized community where everyone is doing their own job. For example, Dilraba Support Association comprises the“president of support association, finance, anti-stigma unit, branch leader, audit personnel and other core management group”. They organize and direct the main internal affairs of the fan groups and then extend down to different fan segments. In this association, there are a range of staffs, including the front line that specializes in offline shooting, drawing, and photo editing, the "post-production artists" who edit the videos, the "data members" who are responsible for "ranking, voting and comment control", and the fans responsible for producing all kinds of "copy-writing" to advertise their idols... Of course, among the fans of popular stars with such a large fan base, so there are still many fans who do not belong to these core parts. They are willing to thumb-up, comment and forward the above "output" related to their idols, and at the same time, follow the figures in the core fan circle to update the dynamics of their idols and understand their idols' every move. Fans will consciously play the "fan role" given to them in the fan group.

Fan groups are just such as the epitome of modern common social groups. In the system under the framework of organizational fans formed the rank of the more conspicuous "big fans - 'specialized fans' - ordinary fans" the structure of the model, also commented by netizens as "the landlord class - the cremation class - civilian class" the structure of the model, reflected in the nature is the potential inequality. A fan said: "Who asks a question is not giving enough love to their idols. Big fans have enough influence and even contact with the studio staff.They have enough confidence. What about the fans at the bottom? Big fans even have small group chat, and what they can communicate privately, not everything will be told to our ordinary fans, right?"

"Big fans" often hold the core information, and they communicate and deal with each other in small groups chatting. Some of them can even communicate with commercial companies directly to spread information beneficial to their idols. Big fans often have a great power to claim in the fan groups, influencing the behavior of younger ordinary fans, especially those who are deeply addicted to their idols, through provocative and emotional words. Thus also derived from the concept of "professional fans", financial companies will contact and give professional fans the corresponding remuneration, using their right to speak and influence the food circle, external publicity to create public opinion.

3.2.2. Group Ritual and Identity

Randall Collins proposed the theory of "interactive ritual chains" and clearly pointed out the three components of "interactive ritual chain": "body together, Group barriers that exclude outsiders and common concerns.” [9] The feedback of these elements forms a cycle in which the combination of "mutual concern" and "emotional solidarity" can form symbols representing the group and give participants emotional energy. In common actions or practices, such as fan meetings or entertainment activities of fan groups, fans often obtain shared emotional states through short-term emotional stimulation under the above three components, and then they get collective excitement. Such interactive rituals enable individuals to gain emotional energy, unite groups, and thus create social relationship symbols (Mass Sacred) and moral standards. Among fans groups, the Mass Sacred is the idol. As a result, a close-knit group of fans is formed.

Activities and practices carried out by fans can be roughly divided into online and offline. The vast majority of fans are eager to establish an intimate connection with their idols, so the fan industry has developed "signing sessions" and "offline fans meetings", where fans can pay a certain amount of time and money in exchange for the opportunity to interact closely with their idols at offline. Offline breaks through the distance of the actual space in the network, adding more real and intense emotions to the interaction of fans. One of the fans said:"It was two and a half years ago, but I remember it well! We were waiting for Dilraba at the minibus station, and the moment her car drove past the door, she looked us! It is a window between cars. Even though the car was moving, we kept our eyes on each other, even though it was only a few seconds. Then she got out of the car and waved hands to us..."

In the offline interaction between idols and fans, fans can enjoy their idols more easily and more thoroughly at close range. Moreover, they break through the online almost single-way effort and become two-way interactions. Therefore, offline communication over and over deepens the emotional experience of fans with idols.

Moreover, most of the time, the fans search on the Internet and have much interaction online. They post information about their idols on social media, on the one hand, to express their love, and on the other hand, to express their desire for recognition among other fans. In the post-epidemic era and the rapid development of the Internet, people lack face-to-face communication with certain offline entities, so a large part of fan communities online communication and interaction make up for the lack of offline communication. Fans in the same fan group have the same idol, which means they have the same interest topic, conducive to interaction and development. Some fans have said

"Fans will understand each other just like normal friends", "Dilraba fans group regularly held some big events, such as' gaming contest' and ‘Singing competition’, and make track for a star of the fans together to participate in this activity,and it is good have a common topic, we feel just like a family! Fans can also have fun on days when Dilraba does not show up."

Obviously, many fans join fan groups not only to pursue their idols, but also to increase certain social activities. In the interaction of fans, even spawned some far from "idol" relationship from the significant interaction. Thus, idols presence are not the only factor that can congregate fans,but fans sometimes can be organized activities by themselves.

When it comes to Mass Sacred, we can see a "religious" belief in fans' cognition of their idols, and the firmness of this belief is strengthened and consolidated through relevant periodic rituals. This kind of ceremony includes "fan meeting", "debut anniversary", "birthday party", and other mass activities. Furthermore through these ceremonies obtaining the idol related to a more profound perception and understanding. A netizen commented:"Dilraba in the birthday party said that she hoped her fans can be like cactus, but also specially emphasized that we are not going to like cactus covered with thorns, but like its flower language as strong. I think she is really gentle, and is sincerely to guide the fans to a good direction."

Idols bring some concepts about ideals, and in the process of transmission to fans, strong spiritual power is transformed based on the firm belief of fans, including worship and recognition. The concept conveyed by idols to fans has a strong sense of identity, which has a profound moral purification effect on most fans. It can be seen that idols need to convey correct values to their fans and guide them correctly. Under this powerful ritual, the cultural industry also infiltrates into it and leads the fans to buy goods through the "spiritual leadership" of the idols to the fans, which significantly promotes the consumption behavior of goods.

3.2.3. Conformity of Fan Groups

Conformity refers to an individual's perception, judgment and understanding of the behavior that conforms to the public opinion or the majority of people under the influence of the behavior of others. Experiments show that only few people can maintain independence and not be conformity, so conformity psychology is a universal psychological phenomenon of some individuals. Zhou Xiaohong’s [13]. study pointed out:"Imitation, in the view of social psychologists, is the way in which people act in a similar way, consciously or unconsciously, in response to a stimulus. The content of imitation is extremely wide, not only limited to behavior, but also includes thinking mode, emotional orientation, customs and even personal character."

As mentioned above, some people pursue their idealized personalities Hence people will follow the trend by chasing these stars or are going to like a star who is loved by the vast majority of people. The next part will analyze it from the perspectives of individual relationship interaction, group pressure and competitive imitation.

Conformity can create strong information pressure. Solomon Asch’s study [14]. said :

"Once an individual is in a group, he becomes one in the group. When he is alone, he may look at something with a very cool and bright attitude; But once he is in a group and the group shows its tendencies, he is no longer dependent on his own judgment... Or adopt a tendency to conform with the group... The presence of a group has a clear and decisive effect."

In the interaction of personal relationships and conformity, people tend to agree that the accepted judgment is correct, especially when they have no clear idea of their own, they tend to rely on others' vision and judgment. Since the other started the behavior and received a good influence, it seems that following the other is difficult to generate big problems. Refer to a netizen in Quora website:"A started to follow the trend. For example, there was a very popular Australian star, Troye Sivan, at that time, I really felt that it was too trendy. She said she loved Troye, and then there was a period of loving Billie Eilish. It was not long before BLACKPINK became very popular and she told me she was a big fan of BLACKPINK..."

Many fans show their aesthetic taste of following the trend to like their idols. This kind of performance also comes from the pressure of incomplete information about this circle, which drives some fans to follow the publicity.

The pressure of the group is also urging people to follow the trend. At the same time, groups and societies have normative influences that drive fans to follow others. There are norms, tangible or intangible, in any group, and adherence to them or not will determine a person's popularity within the group. In school, some students’ interest topic is about the star, their idols in the group of "sparkling" and guide others to like the idol. Moreover, the group in the rest of the people will quit because of will common topic that has been lost or to rejoin the group to follow like an idol to maintain the right of speaking in social groups. Thus it gives rise to blind conformity.

There are also quite a few fans who like their idols to show their taste beyond the public. One netizen commented “Some fans want to prove that their idols are better than them, so they make some ‘comparison videos’, and then there are arguments in the comments below. This is probably how fans want to express their superiority.” What kind of idol a person likes can largely explain his or her ideal self. Alternatively, the idols who like different styles are the tastes of different styles, announcing their own aesthetic orientation to others. It is undeniable that aesthetic appreciation is different in different society. On the other hand, the differences are relative, leading to competitive imitation among people of similar status.

3.2.4. Summary

Social factors affect the psychological state of fans in many ways. The fan group is not an ideal "utopia" but a relatively obvious hierarchical boundary, which is the epitome of the modern ordinary society. The close connection between fans can make up for the lack of communication in the real world and help fans gain a stronger sense of community identity. Often, the cultural industry will pay special attention to the group experience of fans. Through specific online public opinion and offline face-to-face communication, fans will further strengthen their infatuation with their idols, and involve the fan economy through joint capital promotion with idol. So next, this paper will focus on the fan economy and the huge impact.

3.3. Fans of Economic

Although fans' strong obsession with idols comes from their own initiative, it is not hard to find that the cultural industry has a massive push behind the star-making industry. In Dialectics of Enlightenment, written by Max Horkheimer and Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno, [15]. the concept of cultural industry theory was put forward for the first time, which can be summarized as: "Under capitalism, mass culture is created ‘deliberately combined with its audience’ and has the characteristics of commercialization. This kind of art tends to be extremely worldly, with consumption as the ultimate goal." The cultural industry rapidly and homogenized the production of mass entertainment and the ideology, as to achieve a certain extent to control of the audience's thoughts and serve the capital, business and market logic. This has triggered a frenzy in fans’ consumption behaviour.

3.3.1. Consumption Form of Fans

Fans are willing to consume goods that are directly related to their idols. In the basic stage of fans of economy, many fans express their fanatical feelings for their idols by buying their idols' albums and publications. A fan of ROSÉ said : "Congratulations to ROSÉ, who made her solo debut on March 12. Both the sales volume and the audio supply are steadily rising thanks to everyone's efforts. As a new solo singer, she can achieve such a result, not only thanks to the unremitting efforts of her fans, but also thanks to the strong support of fans." By purchasing idols’ production, fans can support their idols' careers and project their emotions into the works produced by their idols."Every day I fall in love with her is a surprise. Take ROSÉ’s solo debut, for example. The retro and cinematic album is designed by herself. Both songs were co-written by ROSÉ ... We can't imagine how pure she is and how much she is talented in music. I only hope she can be happy with music and we can help her realize her dream."

Thus, fans are not purchasing the idols' products. In other words, they are paying for the emotional communication between fantasy idols and them with a strong symbolic meaning.

Of course, capital will not only take advantage of fans' psychological mechanism to promote the direct products produced by idols, such as records, which cannot maximize the benefits to capital. Therefore, various products are derived from idols, such as "star endorsement products", to expand the consumption area. The products are extended from artistic products produced in the cultural industry to daily necessities, including clothing, food, housing and transportation. Moreover, a large number of advertisements are carried out to expand sales. On the one hand, the popularity of the product can be increased through the popularity of the idol, and at the same time, the emotion of the fans can be used to promote the consumption of the products. "Support NARS advertising spokesperson Sean Xiao. Remember to look for the same style as Sean Xiao and note ‘bought by Sean Xiao’ s fans”. It can increase the commercial value of idols, and enable fans to imitate the lifestyle of idols, forming a demonstration effect. Nevertheless in recent years, the effect of celebrity endorsement has been questioned by professional organizations. Liu Daoming, [16]. an analyst at Sinolink Securities, explained in a research report: "For low-priced products (less than 100 yuan), celebrity endorsements have the strongest effect in promoting consumption, and the purchase rate of low-priced products is the strongest, while the situation is different for mid-to-high priced products."

The phenomenon of "buying goods with idols" is closely related to the price of goods. However, it can be seen that idol endorsement almost covers the whole stage of products.

Under the rapid development of the cultural industry, a new and huge consumption model has appeared. In the show “Youth With You Season 2”, capital penetrates the entertainment consumption industry chain and generates significant profits from the consumption behaviors triggered by fans' "Making a list, voting and fund-raising". In the case of the popular talent show that was canceled recently, fans had to buy milk from brand sponsors to get voting rights to support their idols. In this consumption model, fans directly support their idol's career through money payment instead of obtaining physical goods.

3.3.2. Symbol Consumption

The consumption behavior of fans is not the consumption of ordinary people who pay attention to the product’s practicality. Fans tend to pay more attention to the symbolic meaning of the product to carry out symbolic consumption. Symbol consumption refers to when consumers consume a certain commodity, they are no longer limited to the satisfaction of the attributes and use efficiency of the commodity, but pay more attention to the symbolic meaning attached to the commodity. In this kind of consumption practice, consumption is no longer a simple economic behavior, but a cultural behavior that takes commodities as symbols and interprets them differently.Under symbol consumption behavior, consumers usually pay more attention to the concept of participating producers and the endowed meaning conveyed behind the appearance, function and quality of products.

Therefore, goods in symbol consumption have a strong symbolic meaning. Idols are often successful, beautiful and happy images in the eyes of fans, bringing fans a wonderful fantasy about the blueprint of life. Through "it can obtain the ideal life emotional experience" to strengthen the fans' consumption desire. This idea is transmitted through the idol who speaks for it. "Tenderness is also powerful, and beauty is also independent and confident, which is the shining beauty of modern women. Inspired by this, ROSEONLY launched the ‘Dance of roses’ flower gift, combining the ‘soft with firm’ ribbon and the soft powder flower box, together with the advertising spokesperson Dilraba, to send a carol of love for women.” Said one brand’s spokesman.

Through the combination of the idol's own external temperament and product design concept, the symbolic meaning of "soft with firm" is formed and conveyed to the fans, to promote sales. Beneath the surface of symbolic consumption, the essence of fans is still "emotional projection". Through consumption and other practical means, they seek further connection between their idols and themselves, and thus approaching the ideal quality of life. the process of consumption also brought fans a strong psychological satisfaction experience. The "voting consumption" mentioned above has derived from other psychological mechanisms in "realizing an idealized life". When voting, fans are not looking up to their idols. On the contrary, businesses will give fans strong psychological hints that "fans can control the follow-up trend of the program and decide the fate of their idols". "This voting method gives me the power to choose, and we can finally support our favorite contestant's successful debut, which is all behind the efforts of the fans." In this kind of voting consumption behaviour, the status of fans is greatly enhanced, bringing a sense of self-satisfaction.

However, there is also a risk that the symbolism of goods will be manipulated by capital. Naturally, it is necessary to create products in line with the psychological mechanism of fans, which can also be said to compete for the emotional capital of fans and urge fans to express their support and love for their idols through consumption, to promote the sales of products. The transmission and presentation of the symbolic meaning of commodities still rely on establishing particular connection with the attributes created by the idols. This needs to start by cultivating idols in line with public recognition. Moreover, the products endorsed by idols are generally consistent with the characteristics and temperament displayed by idols themselves. To create this correspondence, idols often choose to create characters with distinctive persona.Idols not only use their own superior appearance conditions to get success, but also need media publicity, variety shows, interviews and other ways to create idols under the lens of the mainstream recognition of the external three-dimensional character image.This kind of person set is not perfect, the shaping of the person set is changed with the needs of fans, which is a quite democratic appeal. The setting of idols is often determined by the degree of preference of the audience. Yet icons are often at risk of go against persona. Many media report this news : “For several days, actor Ronald Zhai, who also has a PhD from Beijing Film Academy and is a postdoctoral candidate at Peking University, has been in danger of collapsing persona as a ‘student with excellent academic records’. Ronald Zhai was questioned by netizens when he could not find published papers, plagiarized papers, or inflated his doctoral degree."

At the same time, the excessive marketing of idols has produced a strong side effect, which is also the resistance of consumers who find that idols are excessive as symbol goods.

3.3.3. Resistance and Incorporation

Although capital permeates the culture industry, fans are not entirely manipulated. They have a certain amount of initiative. With the development of the fans of economy, the fan base explodes, making the fans' right of speech improve step by step. As a result, they not only become the recipients of the commodity economy but also rely on the "public opinion basis" to "protect the interests of idols" to fight against the cultural industry. A media reported that: "A large group of fans protested at the shopping mall where Yang Mi was performing, and the item #Yang Mi fans boycott Jia Hang offline# also fermented on Weibo for a whole day. To put it more plainly, they believe that Jaywork Studio, which Yang Mi belongs, is destroying Yang Mi's future by tying up new stars with shoddy homemade dramas.”

Fans are worried that the involvement of capital will affect their idol's performing careers. The fan group is the opposite of capital to self-positioning, and they have a resistance consciousness to capital infiltrating the money-oriented controlling idol behavior.

However, the collective power of fans is not strong enough. Because fans“consume idols" comes from the cultural industry, this connection is impossible to get rid of, and the fanatical infatuation and fantasy generated by fans for idols will make fans lose the ability to judge objective facts. The position of fans is based on the emotion of loving their idols. The culture industry and interest groups thus laid hands on who to incorporate the fan culture. It is the production of the cultural industry that makes idols possible. Dick Hebdige case reveals the capital society as a destiny of subculture phenomenon: "the meaning of subculture groups to produce new and confrontational manner, then the meaning is the capital and market integration and utilization of spread when commodity economy of the world put the subculture It was devastating to the subculture when it was transformed into a lucrative commodity. Subcultural styles begin with the challenge of initiating signs and end with the rigidity of establishing a new set of conventions."

Fans gain certain appeal on the surface, but they are still involved in the trend of commercialization under the control of the capital logic behind. The large-scale boycott of Yang Mi's fans against the idol economic company stems from the fans' support and pursuit of their idol's ideal career. They choose to fight to change the phenomenon of Yang Mi involving "bad films" and help the idol's career development. However, they neglected the fact that idol autonomy has certain initiative --Yang Mi herself also has a choice of film sources, but she chose to shoot these entertainment works with huge profits. In the meantime, most fans will still support Yang Mi's next "bad movie" even after the struggle fails. Because the existence of the symbolic meaning of the idol itself is more important in the hearts of fans, the status of the works produced by the idol in front of the idol itself is reduced, which is the psychology of losing the ability of rational judgment. Therefore, idols and the capital behind them are still not short of supporters and heat. In the commercialized entertainment program, making profits is the ultimate goal. Fans behind the company's integrity and ignores the idols and economy of business logic, they will not really regardless of Yang Mi under a shoddy work, instead of images to create a heat comfort zone, form the market, companies and idol made heat, so do not keen on actual artistic value creation. So there is a strange phenomenon of contradiction and cooperation between fans and capital.

3.3.4. Summary

Today's entertainment industry is an industry that is permeated by capital. Its ultimate purpose is not to create art but to earn profits. The cultural industry uses the psychological mechanism of fans and guides fans to materialize their emotions through purchasing goods, thus forming a fan economy with significant influence. As a unique representative of "youth subcultures", fan culture resisted the cultural industry infiltrated by capital but was controlled by capital logic and established a new set of consumption logic, which also marked the process of subculture's gradual decline.

4. Conclusion

This paper analyzes the psychological mechanism of individual fans and groups as well as the influence and trend of the "fan economy" brought by fans. This paper profoundly analyzes and explains the typical cases of the current Chinese "fans culture" by using the classic theory of psychology. As a participant of the deep fan culture, the author selected relatively common and well-known events, with strong credibility, but there are still some problems, such as the macro perspective is not deep enough. Therefore, this paper only provides a new perspective for the majority of researchers, hoping to provide some help to the researchers of youth subculture.

As fans play a dominant role on the Internet 2.0 era, they hugely impact the whole era. It has brought the "flow of breaking circles", produced a fan culture with distinct characteristics, and fan economy accounts for a large proportion of the market. Under the rapid development of the cultural industry, the problem of rice circle deformity can not be underestimated. The author expects that the academic circle will continue to conduct in-depth research on fan culture with an objective and respectful attitude and seek real solutions to eliminate "alienation".