Zhou Jiaxin, Zheng Kaidan, Zhu Ya, Jiang Wan, Huang Ling, Wang Jia, Li Wanqing/Wen

64 year old Wang Yada once again flashed a "rocket" into the live broadcast room. Fireworks exploded on the screen, and the voice of the young male anchor immediately sounded: "Mom! You're here! My son misses you so much

Wang Yada quickly typed out a line of words: "Son is amazing, Mom supports you

This scene has repeatedly played out in her life over the past three years. In the two WeChat live streaming rooms of "Shaonuan 198 Shaojia Class 18 Tieqi" and "Shaojun 3351 Shaojia Class", Wang Yada has accumulated over 500000 yuan in rewards.

It is not uncommon for elderly people like Wang Yada to flock to live streaming rooms and become the "number one big sister" at great expense. During the interview, some people had a strained relationship with their children due to blindly rewarding them in the live broadcast room, some were cheated of their savings by live teaching in order to find a sense of existence, and some elderly people enjoyed live streaming and unlocked a new way of life for the elderly. The vivid individuals outline the real and easily overlooked life and spiritual status of the silver haired group behind the live broadcast room.

The 53rd Statistical Report on China's Internet Network Development released by China Internet Information Center shows that the silver haired people are becoming a huge group that cannot be ignored in the wave of digital live broadcasting. As of now, the number of elderly internet users aged 60 and above in China has reached 170 million, and tens of millions of short videos are created and published by people aged 50 and above every day. But behind the huge amount of data, there are also some elderly people who are addicted to virtual emotions in live streaming rooms and find it difficult to extricate themselves. A series of real problems such as frequent large payments and falling into various consumption traps urgently need attention.

Previously, the China Consumers' Association had issued a consumer warning, stating that the trap of elderly consumption has become a hot topic for consumer complaints, and live streaming false advertising and induced payment are precisely misleading the elderly population.

Huo Hanzhe, a psychologist of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and a positive psychology instructor of Tsinghua University, said that the essence of the close live broadcast of the elderly is that their needs for emotional companionship and self-worth have not been met. Criticizing blindly is meaningless. As long as the boundaries between health, safety, and family are maintained, live streaming can also become a warm spiritual harbor for later life.

Make 500000 to become the 'Top Sister' on the list

Before retirement, Wang Yada worked at a securities company in Ningbo, Zhejiang. He spent his entire life dealing with money and has always been particularly cautious about it. However, in his later years, he flooded into live streaming rooms and exhausted his savings to give rewards to idols.

Her tipping was not a momentary impulse. After retirement, Wang Yada's life has always been firmly occupied by household chores: her father who is bedridden for a long time and her mother who is weak and sickly all need her to take care of her step by step; After her mother passed away in 2022, she took on the heavy responsibility of taking care of her younger brother who had suffered a stroke and was living alone.

Working day after day has almost squeezed all of her personal space. Wang Yada has no friends in this city, her children cannot accompany her for a long time, and there are no leisure and entertainment activities. Her social circle keeps shrinking, and she often feels lonely.

In 2023, by chance, Wang Yada stumbled upon the live broadcast room of the "Shao Jia Ban" team. In the camera, a young male anchor uses a high magnification beauty filter, covers nostalgic old songs, and interacts with the audience with intimate language to chat. In my son's opinion, these types of anchors have deliberate words and actions, and their style is average, but they don't want to become Wang Yada's only emotional outlet in the future.

The constant sound of 'mom' in the live broadcast room also allowed her to temporarily escape reality.

Wang Yada is not only a loyal audience, but also one of the top performers in this live streaming room. No one taught her how to operate it, she explored and skillfully played various functions in the live broadcast room, and her proficiency in operation was no less than that of young people. Since 2023, she has been using two WeChat accounts to continuously brush gifts and reward two male anchors from the same MCN organization with a total of 500000 yuan.

As a die hard fan, regardless of whether the anchor's broadcast time is fixed or not, even if it delays eating or resting, she will always stay on time; Even when going out to play with her family, she always holds her phone and supports the "son" on the screen.

Speaking of his mother's gift brushing behavior, his son Brown expressed great helplessness. She told me that this live streaming room can make money. But in the end, at most, the anchor added her on WeChat and sent two or three hundred red envelopes during festivals and holidays.

The so-called earning money is fake, earning emotions is real, "Brown said.

In mid-2025, Brown gradually realized that something was wrong with his mother: the anchor often referred to her as "mom", with a WeChat rating of 40 and a large number of high-value consumption records kept in the background. At this moment, he realized that his mother had already been trapped in the live broadcast room and couldn't extricate herself. But whenever Brown takes the initiative to inquire and dissuade, Wang Yada always remains vague, repeatedly insisting that she is only "making money" in the live broadcast room.

To prevent his mother from blindly giving large rewards, Brown and his mother played a "cat and mouse game" at home.

At the beginning, Brown directly confiscated his mother's phone, cancelled his WeChat account, froze the account, and transferred the remaining 86000 yuan in the card to his own name for safekeeping. But Wang Yada's reaction caught him off guard. She cried and rolled around like a child, asking me to return the 86000 yuan to her, "said Brown, who was worried. In the end, he had to compromise and refund the money.

In the second round of dissuasion, Brown chose to call the police for help. After the police arrived, they could only advise and educate the elderly, but could not fundamentally solve the problem. Brown said, "At present, relevant regulations have not clearly defined such behavior as illegal and irregular, and it is difficult to hold the anchor responsible." Regarding the 500000 yuan that has already been brushed out, Brown's response to the police was that "if it is a minor brushing gifts, they can be returned, but the elderly are adults and must bear legal responsibility themselves.

Helpless, Brown launched a third round of persuasion, mobilizing his uncle, aunt, and other relatives to come to persuade him in turn. However, Wang Yada always promised to "stop brushing, stop brushing" in person, but still avoided his family and avoided brushing.

After several rounds of both soft and hard tactics, this family game ultimately ended in Brown's compromise. Brown returned 86000 yuan, and Wang Yada quickly applied for a new phone card, logged on WeChat, and returned to the live broadcast room. Brown also tried to bring more children back to accompany him, but the results were minimal. She just likes to chat with strangers and doesn't like to chat with me, including her own grandson who hasn't watched much

Brown said, "I hope the platform can regulate it properly. For example, monthly quota control should be set for consumption in live streaming rooms. However, currently there are no relevant restrictions on WeChat live streaming. I have complained about this inaction many times, but it has not improved

I want to be a broadcaster

At 8:10 pm, Aunt Huang, a 66 year old woman from an ordinary family in Dezhou, Shandong, sat in front of her phone screen on time. A familiar "good evening" opened her two-hour daily live streaming time.

Aunt Huang's live stream began with a chance short video browsing in October 2024. At that time, she painted "Aunt Feeling" and "Sister Cold Ice 1" on Tiktok. She was very touched when watching her peers broaden their lives, increase their income, and live their old age in a vivid way through live broadcast. With the idea of giving it a try, Aunt Huang embarked on the path of becoming a live streamer.

During the day, she is an ordinary aunt who guards the water shop and manages the business; At night, she transforms into the "Empress Dowager" in the live broadcast room, accompanying netizens on the other end of the screen with chatting and singing. In the past two years, she has almost never been absent. Even if there are occasional delays, she will go online on time around 8:30, live stream for two hours every night, and drop off before 10:30 on time.

Aunt Huang also remembered that in order to achieve satisfactory live streaming results for the first time, she had handwritten several pages of documents in advance, densely filled with slogans and interactive scripts for the broadcast, and even drafted slogans such as "Attention, family! Tonight's broadcast, exclusive welfare arrangements, come and stay" to attract traffic. When it comes to actually getting started, the process is far from as smooth as expected. I wanted to open the live streaming room, but couldn't find the live streaming entrance. In the end, with the help of my son, I was able to successfully start my first live stream.

During a live broadcast, she learned how to sing and dance from others, but after a few performances, her physical strength was exhausted; I want to take the initiative to chat with the audience in the live broadcast room, but often remain silent. After the first live broadcast, there were no more than ten people online.

The chaos in the live streaming room made Aunt Huang realize her shortcomings and consciously improve her professional live streaming skills. She often goes to similar live streaming rooms and pays attention to other people's broadcasting methods and experience sharing; When encountering questions that I don't understand, such as how to organize live content, how to maintain fans, etc., I will also proactively message other anchors for advice.

During the intervals between guarding the store and selling water, she would take out her phone to watch other people's live broadcasts, trying to understand their rhythm, language expression, and ability to adapt on the spot; After the evening broadcast, they will actively review and check data such as sound waves and fans. Throughout this process, she learned that some people refuse to pay for live streaming because they follow the trend and fail to recoup their costs. They neither pay for classes nor purchase new professional equipment, relying solely on their own exploration.

In this way, Aunt Huang gradually found the suitable live streaming rhythm for herself, and live streaming became a part of her later life.

Auntie Cai, also known as the 'old drifters', was once a member of the millions of elderly live broadcasts. Two years ago at 8 pm in Guangdong, thousands of miles away, she also sat in front of the camera, speaking Mandarin with Hubei dialect, and said to the screen, "Good evening everyone, thank you for coming to my live broadcast room. It just started broadcasting, and everyone who passed by came in to take a look

She has lived in rural Hubei for most of her life. A few years ago, at the invitation of her daughter, she left her hometown to Guangdong to help take care of her grandchildren and became a typical "old drifter" in the city. Every morning, Aunt Cai wakes up early to prepare breakfast for the whole family, then watches her daughter and son-in-law go out to work, and then holds their hands to take them to school.

After finishing all the household chores, the remaining free time became the most unbearable moment of her day. Most urban neighbors are distant from each other and have little contact with each other, which is completely different from the atmosphere in rural hometowns where they are neighbors and can chat and chat at any time.

Living in the same building, neighbors may not even have met in person, let alone visited to chat, "Aunt Cai said.

The emergence of live streaming has added new hope to Aunt Cai's life.

In 2024, Aunt Cai accidentally came across live streaming content and was quickly attracted by the lively atmosphere of the live streaming room and the anchor's full emotional state. At first, I just casually browsed and only watched for about 20 minutes every day. Later, I came across many bloggers of the same age from rural areas like her, sharing their experiences of "zero foundation broadcasting, three sentence fan acquisition, and easy money making", and was immediately attracted. After a while, Aunt Cai had the idea of starting her own broadcast.

Aunt Cai said, "It's like finding a new value in life

In order to do a good job of live streaming, Aunt Cai spent 60 yuan online on a shopping platform to purchase a live streaming script manual. The book compiled a set of applicable scripts for opening, attracting traffic, retaining people for interaction, and ending thanks. For example, at the beginning, one should passionately shout "Welcome new family members, the anchor has just started broadcasting, everyone should give a thumbs up first"; When interacting with traffic diversion, they will say 'like a thousand, I will give everyone benefits'; When receiving traffic, we should shout 'Family members witness together, how many people can we break through online after the lucky bag ends'.

After being prepared, Aunt Cai officially started her personal live broadcast, which lasted for one to two hours a day, mainly focused on chatting and heart to heart talks. This persisted for three months. Normally, Aunt Cai is not good at speaking, but once she sits in front of the camera, her emotions become high and she talks confidently.

At first, Ms. Dai, the daughter, was very supportive of Aunt Cai's live broadcast, believing that it could not only help the elderly pass their leisure time, but also provide some support. Therefore, she did not interfere too much, and occasionally helped her debug her phone, recharge Douyin coins, and enter the live broadcast room to support interaction.

Over the course of three months, she has accumulated more than 4000 fans, with dozens of people online for each live stream, and has also gained twenty to thirty loyal "fans". Influenced by it, Aunt Cai also learned the social rules of the live broadcast room to maintain "human relationships". When other anchors come to give tips, she will carefully record the time and amount of the tips, and "return gifts" in a timely manner; If you encounter a large amount of rewards, you will feel particularly uneasy and choose to actively broadcast. Overall, her live streaming income can only achieve a balance between income and expenses.

Even if she didn't make any money, online companionship still helped her regain a sense of familiarity with her hometown. Every day, netizens from all over the world accompany us to chat, often chatting for more than an hour. In her spare time, she also shares her experience of entering the industry and her past life experiences with "fans" in the live broadcast room. Many fans are influenced by her and have also had the idea of trying to start broadcasting.

But as the investment deepened, in the eyes of her family, her live streaming life gradually "spiraled out of control".

At first, Aunt Cai only broadcasted live for two hours from 9pm to 11pm every night. Later, she also had to make time to broadcast before sending her grandson off from school. Speaking continuously for a long time is very physically demanding, and over time, her voice often becomes hoarse and damaged. Under long-term overdrafts, his body became increasingly exhausted and his mental state became increasingly tense. In the view of her daughter, Ms. Dai, live streaming is a way to adjust her life and should not be overly addicted, so she began to actively interfere with her mother's live streaming schedule.

As an "old drifter" who settled in a foreign land, Aunt Cai lacked the right to speak in her daughter's home and was forced to reduce her live streaming frequency. But she still maintains the habit of watching live teaching videos, which has planted new "thunder" for her future live streaming life.

One night, an anchor who claimed to be a "teacher" contacted her in a Kwai private letter. If she wanted to continue learning live teaching, she had to pay tuition fees to continue. At first, Aunt Cai was wary and did not pay at the Alipay collection code sent by the other party, but she could not withstand repeated lobbying from the other party. She began to remit 500 yuan in batches. By the time her daughter discovered it, she had already transferred 4 times, totaling 2000 yuan. Her family immediately brought her to the police, but the fraudsters were far away in Hainan, making it extremely difficult to trace the clues. The account involved was ultimately banned by the platform, and the money that was stolen was not recovered.

Faced with the blow of fraud and the dissuasion of her family, Aunt Cai finally stopped her live streaming and fully returned to her offline daily life.

How to release emotional needs

How to guide the elderly correctly when the silver wave meets the digital age?

Huo Hanzhe believes that the essence of elderly people's closeness to live streaming is the unmet need for emotional companionship and self-worth. According to Erikson's theory of the eight stages of life, the core psychological needs of elderly people in their later years are to obtain a sense of self-improvement and value, hoping to convey life wisdom, gain recognition and respect.

In reality, many elderly people's experiences are not recognized by their children and their social circles are narrow, which can easily lead to a sense of 'abandonment by the times'. Live streaming rooms provide a low-cost, high feedback, and stress free space for expression. Many elderly people insist on live streaming, continuous learning, and expanding their social circle, essentially achieving self realization through live streaming and gaining respect and a sense of value that are difficult to obtain in real life. This has more psychological significance than monetary gains, "said Huo Hanzhe.

The 53rd Statistical Report on Internet Development in China released by China Internet Network Information Center shows that the number of elderly Internet users aged 60 and above in China has reached 170 million; According to the Social Responsibility Report of Tiktok Group, there will be 23 million videos every day in 2023, created by middle-aged and elderly people over 50 years old.

In Huo Hanzhe's view, watching and doing live broadcasts for the elderly is not a problem in itself, the key is to uphold three bottom lines: not being deceived, not harming health, and not abandoning the family. Many family conflicts arising from live streaming are not rooted in the live streaming itself, but rather in children's lack of understanding of the needs of the elderly. Forcefully taking back their phones and freezing their accounts will only intensify confrontation and make the elderly more dependent on the online world. Children should first understand the respect and companionship that the live streaming room brings to the elderly, and then guide them appropriately in a respectful and empathetic manner

Huo Hanzhe said that when elderly people spend their retirement savings on gifts, they also have autonomy in managing their assets. Children should respect this premise before discussing communication and guidance. But the platform and regulatory authorities should clarify the red line of behavior, strictly prohibit broadcasters from engaging in private transactions and emotional manipulation to induce consumption, and promptly dispose of illegal accounts.

At 10 pm, Aunt Huang's live streaming room was still lit up, and she was still chatting softly with her "family". On the other end of the screen, there were familiar IDs.

Thousands of miles away in Guangdong, Aunt Cai has put down her live streaming camera and calmed down to learn handicrafts, meet new friends, and try to pass the time in her free time.

Aunt Cai said that even though she had been deceived before, that live streaming experience still left a deep impression on her. From learning to perform complex operations with smartphones, to daring to express and interact, and more importantly, understanding that later life is not just about housework and waiting

(The author of this article is a graduate student from the School of Language and Communication, Beijing Technology and Business University, graduating in 2025)