Many people really like celebrities and admire them a lot. But a new study says there might be a problem with that. It suggests that people who worship celebrities may not be very smart.
Their thinking and understanding abilities could be lower compared to others who don't idolize famous people.
This study suggests a potential setback to this phenomenon.
Researchers conducted a series of cognitive tests on a sample of participants who identified themselves as celebrity worshippers.
The scientists asked 1,763 adults from Hungary to take part in an online survey.
They wanted to understand how smart these people were, so they gave them tests to measure two specific types of intelligence.
The first test focused on vocabulary to see how well participants knew words.
The second test called the digit symbol test, checked how good they were at solving problems quickly.
The participants were also asked to fill out a questionnaire called the Celebrity Attitude Scale which helped the researchers understand how much these people were obsessed with celebrities.
The results indicated that individuals who showed high levels of celebrity worship tended to perform poorer on the cognitive tests compared to those with lower levels of celebrity worship, or even didn't idolize them.
After performing the tests, the researchers classified participants into different categories based on their level of interest in celebrities.
Those who simply enjoyed talking about celebrities with friends were considered "entertainment-social" fans.
The next level, "intense-personal," included individuals who couldn't stop thinking about celebrities and had a strong emotional attachment.
The highest level of obsession, called "borderline-pathological," involved people who agreed with statements suggesting they would do illegal things if asked by their favorite celebrity.
When individuals invest a significant amount of their mental and emotional energy into following the lives of celebrities, it may decrease their cognitive functioning in other aspects of life.
This distraction could show up as having a harder time paying attention, not being able to remember things as well, or finding it difficult to solve problems.
Although the study doesn't prove that idolizing celebrities directly affects how smart someone is, it does show that there might be a connection between the two.
