Introduction

Over the past two decades, clinicians have observed a profound shift in how individuals experience reality, relate to fantasy, and regulate their inner worlds. This shift is not limited to any single diagnosis, age group, or social background. Rather, it reflects a broader transformation in perception itself, driven by technological, cultural, and media developments that have altered the way reality is encountered every day, internalised unconsciously, and then psychologically processed.

We are living in an era in which reality is available continuously, instantly, and with unprecedented vividness. Paradoxically, this has simultaneously coincided with an increased reliance on fantasy, dissociation, aestheticisation, and symbolic retreat. From a clinical perspective, this is not contradictory. On the contrary, these developments are closely and causally linked.

This article explores the relationship between contemporary forms of ultra-realism delivered on social media and online platforms and the growing psychological pull toward fantasy, examining how this dynamic shapes emotional regulation, identity formation, and consequently our therapeutic work.

Radical Perceptual Realism and the Saturation of Experience

Never before have human beings had such direct, uninterrupted access to global reality. Through smartphones and platform-based media, individuals are exposed daily to war, disaster, suffering, celebration, intimacy, and catastrophe, often in real time and without any narrative mediation.

This constant exposure produces what can be described clinically as perceptual saturation. Reality is no longer approached gradually or symbolically; it is absorbed continuously and often without psychological preparation. In view of this, the mind is required to process high-intensity stimuli at an accelerated pace that exceeds its traditional buffering capacities.

From a psychotherapeutic standpoint, this oversaturation leads to accelerated internalisation and heightened affective load. Emotional responses are triggered more rapidly than in the past, often without sufficient time for reflection, interpretation, or genuine understanding of meaning. The individual is not merely informed about reality; they are completely immersed in it.

Ultra-Vivid Internalisation and Its Psychological Consequences

The contemporary psyche is increasingly shaped by what may be termed ultra-vivid picturesque internalisation. Events are not only known cognitively but absorbed visually and emotionally in highly concrete forms. Images, clips, and fragments of lived reality enter the internal world unprocessed and with striking immediacy.

Clinically, this can reduce symbolic distance. When symbolic distance collapses, the mind has fewer opportunities to metabolise experience through imagination, narrative, or reflective thought. Instead, undigested raw affect accumulates, often leading to emotional overwhelm, irritability, anxiety, or psychic withdrawal.

Importantly, this process does not depend on direct personal trauma. Exposure alone can be sufficient to generate internal strain, particularly when it is repetitive, vivid, and uncontained.

Why Fantasy Increases in an Age of Extreme Realism

One of the most striking clinical observations of recent years is that increased realism does not lead to greater psychological groundedness. Instead, it frequently leads to increased fantasy, dissociation, social alienation, and symbolic retreat.

The reason for this lies in the regulatory function of fantasy. When reality becomes too immediate, too intense, or too continuous, the psyche seeks rest. Fantasy functions as a form of affect regulation, offering psychic shelter from perceptual overload. It is not just desired, but biologically and psychologically needed in order for an individual to function normally.

In this sense, fantasy operates similarly to other regulatory behaviours such as compulsive distraction, substance use, or emotional numbing. The similarity lies not in content but in function. Fantasy becomes a homeostatic response to an environment that overwhelms the individual’s capacity for emotional processing. It becomes a tool for a significant withdrawal from reality.

The Historical Role of Narrative Feature Film as a Mediator of Reality

For much of the twentieth century, film served a very different psychological function. Cinema acted as a symbolic mediator between the individual and the wider world. It offered structured narratives, aesthetic framing, and evolved into a tool for substantial emotional containment.

For viewers who had never travelled or encountered other cultures directly, film provided a space for imaginative engagement. Reality was filtered through well-developed storylines, absorption of highly desirable lead characters, and it facilitated internal symbol formation. Fantasy and reality were clearly differentiated as separate and fully functional entities, yet meaningfully connected.

In this context, film did not compete with reality. It stood in for it, allowing fantasy to flourish without overwhelming the psyche. It provided fertile ground for significant psychic rest.

The Smartphone and the Collapse of Symbolic Distance

The introduction of smartphones fundamentally altered this previously established, long-term relationship. The distinction between representation, observation, and participation became greatly blurred. Individuals no longer needed to imagine distant places or experiences; they could see them instantly on their high-tech devices, frequently presented more vividly than their own lived environment.

As a result, film lost its unique position as the primary container of fantasy. At the same time, reality lost its protective distance. Fantasy did not disappear; it migrated. It relocated into faces, characters, curated identities, avatars, invented personalities, so-called influencers, and increasingly moved towards artificial or semi-artificial figures. The object of fantasy became more immediate, more personalised, more aesthetically intensified – and most importantly, momentarily contactable. This novelty swiftly affected the perception of choices in life – everything appeared to be easily reached at any time and in plentiful supply, day and night. Whatever choices in terms of people or partners we made, now seemed totally wrong, as someone else always appeared superior to what we had and almost certainly a better fit.

In the long term, this has had a major effect on experience of satisfaction – both internally, in the way we feel about ourselves, and externally, towards other people and social encounters.

A Shift in the Perception of Life and World

The most significant change introduced by these developments is not purely technological but phenomenological. Traditionally, life perceived through films and media was always interpreted first and experienced second. Our choices and prior discussions with others would determine what film, TV programme, or documentary we were going to watch, and then we would see it. Meaning and decision making (read: rational thought) preceded immersion.

Today, experience of immediate viewing often precedes interpretation. Individuals encounter reality directly, mainly through their mobile phones, and are left to make sense of it afterwards, if at all. When natural interpretation fails to occur, fantasy steps in to compensate.

This reversal alters significantly how individuals form identity, manage emotion, and relate to others. It also reshapes expectations of immediacy, intensity, and builds a mindset that expects instant gratification across all age groups.

It deeply affects the way we feel about ourselves and our achievements.

Resolving serious issues is never immediate, yet the expectation for its instant resolution is always present. This results in intense frustration, leaving us anxious and deeply unhappy.

In this instance, the fantasy of immediate resolution is not just desired—it is expected. At this point, it becomes our new reality, shaking our emotions, undermining our confidence, and threatening our sense of well‑being.

Clinical Implications for Psychotherapy

From a psychotherapeutic perspective, these shifts help explain several contemporary clinical phenomena, including rising everyday dissociation, social alienation, unstable identity formation, fantasy-driven attachment patterns, and difficulties with narrative continuity. Attention span, concentration, and the ability to follow ordinary conversations are all affected.

Patients are not necessarily resisting insight or meaning. In many cases, they are massively overloaded with information before meaning can even form. The task of psychotherapy increasingly involves restoring a normal symbolic space, focusing on slowing accelerated thoughts, identifying pathological internal processes, and helping reflective distance to be re-established.

Understanding the cultural conditions that shape our perception of life today is essential. With full awareness of those processes, we can approach these difficulties with greater precision and compassion, recognising fantasy not only as pathology but also as an adaptive response to perceptual excess and overload.

Conclusion

In an age of radical perceptual realism, fantasy no longer disappears. It becomes the psyche’s primary refuge. This is not a sign of weakness or regression but a response to unprecedented levels of sensory and emotional exposure and overstimulation.

For clinicians, recognising this dynamic is essential. It allows therapeutic work to address not only individual symptoms but the broader conditions shaping contemporary inner life and its environmental roots. By restoring symbolic mediation and free-flowing symbol formation, and by creating a fully reflective and exploratory therapeutic space, psychotherapy can help individuals navigate day-to-day reality without being completely consumed and in some cases highly disturbed by it.

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