Britney gossip tonic for teens

By MARTIN JOHNSTON

Parents, don't worry - gossiping about raunchy video starlets such as Britney Spears can be good for your children.

Many youngsters who spend hours talking about pop singers, movie stars or sports heroes fit in well with their friends and are developing normally, psychologists have found.

A British study of nearly 200 young people aged between 11 and 16 found celebrity worshippers were self-confident group players who had created a healthy emotional distance from their parents.

The celebrities became "pseudo friends" to the adolescents, who learned their life stories and chatted about them frequently.

But the Leicester University research, published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, also warns about youngsters who name celebrities as their soul-mates or think about them even when they do not want to.

These intense idol-worshippers are likely to be lonely and lacking close attachments to friends or family.


In New Zealand, teen-marketing specialist Spencer Willis said Warriors halfback Stacey Jones and Christchurch-bred hip hop star Scribe were among teen idols.

Surveys showed that with relatively few local heroes to choose from, many New Zealand youngsters said "mum and dad are their idols. Sir Ed [Hillary] pops up too".

Dr Robyn Dixon, an Auckland University specialist in adolescent development, was not surprised by the British findings.

"There's very little in the literature about popular idols and their role in the development of adolescents.

"It's such a normal thing that nobody has stopped to think about it.

"It's quite normal in early adolescence for young people to take less notice of their parents and start challenging their parents' values ...

"The reassuring thing for parents is that in most cases the kids come back to their roots and the things their families and parents value."

Teen idols could be positive for young people as something they held in common, Dr Dixon said.

"People talk about idolising these heroes. It's almost like being able to practise having a boyfriend or girlfriend.

"You can play out your feelings with this person who is not going to dump you.

"That's always how it's been. We probably think it's more predominant because these people are much more in our face than they used to be. They're far more visible.

"In my mother's day it was Clark Gable or somebody. In my day it was the Beatles or Rolling Stones."