October 19, 2007
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Why do people tend to care so much about celebrities?
People are just following age-old patterns of behavior without thinking about the reasons or the results. It is a large scale manifestation of the same psycho-social factors that cause people to be interested in and talk about their neighbors. Some people care a lot more about celebrities than others do, and I suspect that those are the same people who care the most about what their next door neighbor does.
Many factors, such as snobbery, curiosity, or narcissism, can influence how much interest a person takes in other people and about which other people one tends to care. In a small village, high status individuals are more likely to be talked about than those of lower status, largely because the higher status people are better known to everyone. It is more enjoyable talking about someone when everyone in the conversation knows the person under discussion.
The more notoriety or status a person has, the more people will be interested in his or her activities. Anything which brings notoriety, such as a singer with a popular song, an actor with a role in a successful movie, or a politician who gets arrested, arouses interest and discussion. People also have valid reasons for wanting to know about the ones whose political status, wealth, or social position might give them power and influence over any aspect of one’s life. Media response to the demand for information creates even greater demand by increasing the celebrity’s notoriety.
The psycho-social programming behind that phenomenon is certainly older than civilization. Biologists studying apes and elephants, for example, have noted that their social groups tend to keep track of both the leaders and the young, and to communicate about them. The effect of a global culture and electronic communication has been to magnify this to an absurd degree.
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Comments (4)
And then there’s the sheer entertainment of the ‘train wreck’ factor.
“Oh my god, she did WHAT?? Are you serious?? And there are pictures??” *running to google*
I was going to comments on the ‘train wreck’ factor, too.
I think its because “most” people would like the publicity themselves or to be “loved” in the public eye, everyone says “if i was in that position” but they would all be the same and get caught out, what they forget is how difficult it is to lead a “normal” life when just going to the supermarket turns into a photo shoot or having a quiet beer in a bar is impossible, back in the 70′s in england i was in the position to sample this because a lot of my friends were “famous” at the end of the day i feel sorry for them,
I think most people want to be someone they are not and are not happy with who they are and the life they are living…personally, I have never understood the point….and like my dad always has said celeberty is like winning the lottery….while the money would be nice….it never makes you happy that you need to find from within