English annotation writing # 3

write an annotation for the reading, 

1st paragraph: the author background information 

2nd paragraph: describe or state the main contents of the reading 

3rd: talk about how this reading can help and support in writing my paper about how celebrity worship impact teenagers’ value shaping negatively.

I also attach a student sample annotation for you to understand how to do write.

The different colors are here to show you the five different parts of each

annotation. Your annotations do not need color and should simply be typed

in black.

Toto, Christian. “Donning The Uniform; Proponents give A+ To Student Dress Code.”

Washington Times, 24 Mar. 2003, B01. Nexis Uni, advance.lexis.com/api/permalink/

b01c400e-6695-48af-a924-271fdf1268c9/?context=1516831. Accessed 3 Aug. 2017.

Christian Toto is a freelance reporter and an award-winning journalist. He has been

writing for newspapers, magazines, and the Web for over ten years, and his work has appeared in

People magazine, MovieMaker magazine, The Denver Post, The Pittsburg Tribune-Review and

The Washington Times. He also provided movie commentary for the Dennis Miller Show and

runs the blog, “What Would Toto Watch?” He is also a member of the Broadcast Film Critics

Association, the Washington DC Area Film Critics Association, and the Denver Film Critics

Society. He currently resides in Denver, Colorado and frequently writes about popular culture

for The Washington Times. (“Topic-Christian Toto.” The Washington Times, The Washington

Times, n.d. washingtontimes.com/topics/christian-toto/. Accessed 3 Aug.

2017.)

Toto writes about the positive impact that school uniforms have had in the Southeast.

Toto interviewed a mother whose four children attend schools that require uniforms, and he

discusses the reasons uniforms are growing in popularity and numbers across the nation. The

parents that he interviewed all said that uniforms have eased their children’s lifestyle and

enhanced their performance in school. Toto writes that in addition to unifying the population of

school, school uniforms have also helped with school safety because no students have been

caught smuggling weapons and there is also significantly less fighting among the students. Toto

also discusses the complaints about uniforms from parents; he writes that the only complaint that

parents had was the high price of the uniforms. However, some parents have donated uniforms

outgrown by their children to help those who cannot afford them. Overall, he explains that the

students and parents have embraced the mandatory uniform policy due to all the positive results,

from elevated mock SAT scores to significantly less brawls in the school. This article will be

helpful in my essay because I can use the author’s research about how school uniforms have

positively affected students’ performance in school to support my argument that schools should

adopt a uniform policy. Another part of the article that I find really helpful is that Toto offers a

solution to the complaints from the parents about the high prices of uniforms. Toto’s article

extends some of the concerns from parents that my article by Mark Johnson only briefly

mentions.

Vitale, Robert “Opinions overflow – Folks at a meeting about a Hilltop Casino were split

between creating jobs or making a dumping ground.” Columbus Dispatch, 6 Jan. 2010,

01A. Nexis Uni, advance.lexis.com/api/permalink/b01c400e-6695-48af-a924-

271fdf1268c9/?context=1527720. 13 Aug. 2017.

Robert Vitale has been a reporter for The Columbus Dispatch since 2004. He graduated

from Ball State University in 1987, and began his career as an editor for The News Dispatch in

Michigan City, Indiana. For over 20 years, Vitale has extended his reporting efforts with the

Lansing State Journal, The Sheboygan Press, and Thomson Newspapers in Washington D.C.

(“Robert Vitale.” Facebook, Facebook, Inc., n.d., facebook.com/bob.vitale.1. Accessed 13 Aug.

2017.)

Vitale details the growing concerns local residents have about Columbus’ decision for a

casino location. The public meetings that were held in 2010 gave casino developers and city

officials clearer insight on what the people on the West Side wanted to gain as a result of the

casino being built in their neighborhood. Vitale writes about the emotional pleas many lifelong

residents of the Hilltop area extended to the panel of leaders at the Greater Hilltop Area

Commission meeting. This article shows the determination for a positive change in an area of

Columbus that rarely gets any attention. This article will be useful because of the predetermined

ideas and concerns that were voiced among area commissions and city leaders. Vitale writes

about how Penn National, the current casino developer, needed additional feedback as they

continued to map out plans for choosing the right location for their building. This also will be a

great addition because I will be able to compare these predicted concerns with those of

neighboring cities (as described in my other article by Corbin Smith) that have already begun to

see the effects of constructing a casino in their city.

Appleby, Andrew D. “Pay at the Pump: How $11 per Gallon Gasoline Can Solve the United

States’ Most Pressing Challenges.” Cumberland Law Review, vol. 40, no. 1, Jan. 2009,

pp. 3-85. EBSCOhost, cscc.ohionet.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.

aspx?direct=true&AuthType=cookie,ip,uid&db=a9h&AN=50467181&site=ehost-live.

Accessed 18 Aug. 2017.

Andrew D. Appleby was a Graduate Tax Scholar in the LL.M. in Taxation program at

Georgetown University Law Center in 2010. Prior to focusing on tax law, he was an associate in

the Energy Infrastructure, Climate, & Technology Group of a leading Atlanta-based law firm. He

has earned the following degrees: J.D. 2008, Wake Forest University School of Law; M.B.A.

2004, University of Massachusetts-Amherst; B.S. 2003, Florida State University. (“Andrew D.

Appleby.” Sutherland, Sutherland Asbill & Brennan LLP, n.d., us.eversheds-sutherland.com/

people/Andrew-D-Appleby. Accessed 29 July 2017. & “Andrew D. Appleby.” Martindale,

Martindale-Hubbell, n.d., martindale.com/new-york/new-york/andrew-d-appleby-44882691-a/.

Accessed 29 July 2017.)

Appleby determines that most of our country’s problems are a result of our addiction and

over-consumption of foreign oil. His major points for change revolve around national security,

climate change, and public health. He believes the solution to the problem would be to greatly

increase the tax on gasoline so that most consumers would literally be unable to afford it. This

would force the expansion of alternative energy solutions. Basically, he predicts that if the price

of gas were to be raised to $11/gal, everyone would drive a hybrid or electric car. He also shows

that new jobs could be created if the percentage of hybrid cars would increase. I can use the

article because it has a lot of powerful examples and statistics about hybrid cars and spending.

Appleby is a big hybrid car supporter. His theory seems so much different than the simple ones

explained in my other articles. They just argue that people should get hybrid cars, but Appleby

takes it a step further and suggests “making” people buy hybrids.

Ferenchik, Mark. “Study: Casino to revitalize West Side.” Columbus Dispatch, 14 July 2011,

1B. Nexis Uni, advance.lexis.com/api/permalink/b01c400e-6695-48af-a924-

271fdf1268c9/ ?context=2834161. Accessed 2 Aug. 2017.

Mark Ferenchik has been a reporter for The Columbus Dispatch since 1998. He graduated

from Kent State University in 1984 with a bachelor’s degree in journalism. His career began by

working as a county court reporter for The Medina County Gazette in Medina, Ohio. He also

continued his efforts as a county, city, and enterprise reporter for The Repository in Canton,

Ohio. Currently, his writing and reporting focuses on urban development, government issues and

sports writing. (“Mark Ferenchik.” linkedin.com, LinkedIn Coporation, n.d., linkedin.com/in/

mark-ferenchik-9351b57. Accessed 1 Aug. 2017.)

Ferenchik writes about the city’s proposals and efforts to expedite the construction

process of the casino development in Columbus. He details how the changing demographics of

the city’s west side will impact how new businesses are marketed to. For instance, he clarifies

that 26% of the people in the area are Latino and developers will have to carefully determine

how to market to them. Marketing, Ferenchick explains, will play a pivotal role for investors and

much attention will need to be given to the already vacant business community. One study

indicated that an increase in annual visitors would ultimately provide $450 million of revenue for

nearby businesses, restaurants and hotels. Ferenchick also reports that the decision to develop a

casino and other new businesses on the West Side will motivate land-developers into

constructing a multi-sport athletic center for AAU athletes, including basketball, volleyball,

indoor track, soccer and mixed martial-arts competitions. This article will be useful for my essay

because it gives insight on what city officials have in store for the west side of Columbus. This

will also provide valid information regarding surrounding business and the positive economic

outlook. Unlike some of my other articles— especially the one by Smithson—this article looks at

the casino as a very positive addition to the community.

IMPETUS FOR WORSfflP: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY
OF ADOLESCENTS’ IDOL ADORATION BEHAVIOR

S

Ying-Ching Lin and Chien-Hsin Li

n

ABSTRACT

The objective of this article is to explore the idolization behaviors of Taiwanese
adolescents. The study gathered 1,636 questionnaires from 13 senior high
schools across northern, central, southern, and eastern Taiwan. The result

s

indicate that adolescents’ gender correlates with the idol type they choose t

o

adore when the idol is male. This study summarizes “exterior,” “interior,”
‘Svealth,” and “athlete” as four underljdng idol traits attracting adolescents.
Various types of idols are considered to be significantly different on these
four traits. The impacts of the four traits on adolescents’ worship levels are
nonsymmetrical. While the traits of exterior and athlete are worship facilita

–

tors, the trait of weedth is a prohibitor. By contrast, the trait of interior is
neutral and has no effect on worship levels. Furthermore, adolescents are
involved in higher levels of worship when the idol is a media star or is the
opposite gender of the adolescent. Generally, adolescents’ worship levels are
heightened by the illusion of a perfect idol, indicating nonrational worshi

p

behaviors. Implications regarding the association between adolescents’ cogni-
tive abilities and idols’ traits are discussed for future research.

INTRODUCTIO

N

The phenomenon of idolization is a characteristic of adolescence.
An idol is someone whose talents, achievements, status, or physical
appearance are especially recognized and appreciated by his or he

r

fans. Since objects of idolization come from various domains of life,
sport champions, movie actors/actresses, television personalities, pop

The authors contributed equally to this research; the order of authorsh

ip

was determined by a coin fiip. The authors gratefully acknowledge Yen-J

u

Chen in conducting the study and coding the data.

Chien-Hsin Lin, Department of International Business Studies, National
Chi Nan University, Nantou, Taiwan, R.O.C. and Department of International
Business, Yu Da College of Business, Miaoli, Taiwan, R.O.C.

Requests for reprints should be sent to Ying-Ching Lin, Department of Busi-
ness Administration, National Dong Hwa University. 1, Sec. 2, Da Hsueh Rd.,
Shou-Feng #974, Hualien County, Taiwan, R.O.C. E-mail: yclin@mail.nd-
hu.edu.t

w

ADOLESCENCE, Vol. 42, No. 167. Fall 2007
Libra Publishers. Inc., 3089C Clairemont Dr., PMB 383, San Diego. CA 92117

stars, and political or religious leaders can all be idolized figur

es

(Raviv, Bar-tal, Raviv, & Ben-Horn, 1996). Idolization can take many
difFerent forms. From extreme cases of suicides and skipping lessons
to catch a glimpse of their idols to listening to CDs casually every now
and then, adolescents show their devotion and admiration of their idols
in various different ways (McCutcheon, Lange, & Houran, 2002).

Psychologists believe that during adolescents’ transition to adult-
hood they form strong attachments to figures around them as they
search for their own identity (Greene & Adams-Price, 1990; Raviv et
al., 1996; Yue & Cheung, 2000). Under such circumstances, identifica-
tion with some adults or peer idols enables adolescents to seek informa-
tion or values and to prepare themselves for an adult role (Erikson,
1964; 1968). Despite this important phenomenon, research on idoliza-
tion behavior is lacking (Cheng, 1997; Yue & Cheung, 2000).

There are several reasons why it may be important to study celebrity
idohzation (Engle & Kasser, 2005). First, the identity of adolescents is
partially constructed by interacting with popular media and celebri-
ties. As per Steele and Brown’s (1995) conclusion that media activities
are important determinants of adolescents’ cognitions and behaviors
and that media are sometimes even used to regulate mood, it is neces-
sary to understand why and how idolization forms in adolescents. Sec-
ond, idolization is an avenue by which they explore romantic views
and attitudes toward interpersonal relationships, especially for girls.
Kamiol (2001) suggested that idolization may affect the types of rela-
tionships they form. Third, idolization may be involved in a subject’s
well-being. For instance, Cheng (1997) found that celebrity fan club
members in Hong Kong reported lower self-esteem than did non-fan
club members. Finally, idolization is clearly relevant to the economi

c

behavior of adolescents.

Studies on idolization in Chinese societies are equally rare and have
been mostly conducted in Hong Kong (So & Chan, 1992; Wong & Ma,
1997; Chan, Cheung, Lee, Leung, & Liu, 1998; Cheung & Yue, 1999;
Yue & Cheung, 2000; see also Yue & Cheung, 2000 for a review). The
purpose of this study is to clarify the social or personahty attributes
of an idol and a model as perceived by adolescents in a Chinese soci-
ety—Taiwan. This exploratory study attempts to describe in depth the
patterns of Taiwanese adolescents’ idol worship behaviors. Specifically,
we delineate the idol traits which attract adolescents, examine how
adolescents rate their favorite idols based on underlying idol traits,
and finally explore the relationship between idol traits and adolescents’
worship levels.

576

METHOD

Participants
A mail survey was conducted of students from 13 senior high schools

across Taiwan; 2,100 questionnaires were mailed and 1,958 were re-
turned. After deleting questionnaires with incomplete data, 1,636 were
used for analysis. The response rate was 77.9%.

Measures
The questionnaire was designed to measure respondents’ criteria for

choosing favorite idols and models. It is composed of idol characteris-
tics, reasons for worship, intensity of respondents’ worship levels, an

d

respondents’ characteristics. Eight dichotomous items regarding rea-
sons for worship were augmented from Chiang (2003). The worship
levels were measured using the 17-item, 5-point Likert type celebrity
worship scale (McCutcheon et al., 2002). The reliability of the celebrity
worship scale estimated with Cronbach’s alpha was 0.94. The worship
levels (McCutcheon et al., 2002) suggest three increasingly extreme
sets of idol worship behavior: individualistic behaviors, social activi-
ties, and borderline pathology. As worship level increases, these behav-
iors increasingly occur together. Since the celebrity worship construct
is best considered as unidimensional, we calculate the mean score of
the 17 items to represent respondents’ intensity of worship levels.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

Sample Characteristics
The sample of adolescents is composed of more females (83.3%) than

males (16.7%), and the mean age is 17 years with a range from 15 to
19. Thirty-two percent of the adolescents are in their first level of
senior high school, 32.8% in the second level, and 35.6% in the third
level. The residential areas of the sample are 34.2% in northern Tai-
wan, 32.5% in central Taiwan, 23.9% in southern Taiwan, and 9.4

%

in eastern Taiwan. Overall, the sample appears to be adequate in rep-
resenting Taiwanese senior high school adolescents’ idol adoration be-
haviors. Table 1 summarizes the sample characteristics.

Adolescents’ Favorite Idols
The gender of the adolescents’ favorite idols is more male (65.4%)

than female (34.6%). Consistent with Yue and Cheung’s results in

577

Table 1:

Gender
Fema

le

Male

Age (in Years)
15
16
17
1

8

19

Senior High School Lev

el

First

Second
Third

Residential Are

a

Northern Taiwan
Central Taiwan

Southern Taiwan
Eastern Taiwan

Sample Charactenstics
N

1,362
274

28
41

1

635
506
56

516
537

583

56

0

531
391
154

%

83.3
16.7

1.7
25.1
38.8
30.9
3.4

31.5
32.8
35.6

34.2
32.5
23.9
9.4

Hong Kong (2000), most (66.8%) ofthe selected favorite idols are celeb-
rities in media or entertainment fields (e.g., actors, singers, or ath-
letes). Some (10.1%) are noncelebrities (e.g., family, friends, or
teachers), and some (10.7%) are fictitious characters (e.g., Spiderman),
whereas few are politicians (3.0%), intellectuals (4.6%), or entrepre-
neurs (4.8%). According to the results, adolescents tend to worship
idols who are accessible in their daily lives (e.g., noncelebrities) or
through mass media (e.g., media stars and fictitious characters). As to
the reasons for idolization, “Good-looking” was chosen most (41.4%),
while “rich” was the least (9.0%). Table 2 summarizes the idol charac-
teristics and reasons for idolization.

Does Gender Matter?
Since the data on idols’ characteristics show a gender difference

in terms of favorites, more extensive analyses were conducted. Results
indicate that the gender of more than half of the adolescents (55.5%)
chose is opposite from that of their favorite idols. Table 3 shows that

578

Table 2: Idol Characteristics

Gender
Female
Male

Idol

Type

Media Stars (e.g., actor, singer, or athlete)
Politicians
Intellectual Idols (e.g., scientist, writer,
musician, or artist)
Entrepreneur Idols
Non-Celebrities (e.g., family, friend, or
teacher)
Fictitious Characters (e.g., Spiderman)

Reasons for Idolization
Good-looking
Attractive dressing
Attractive body shape
Rich
Humorous and funny
Knowledgeable and clever
Sporty
Civic-minded and caring

N

566
1070

1093
49
76

78
165

175

677

370
368
148
529
571
365
385

%

34.6
65.4

66.8
3.0
4.6

4.8

10.1

10.7

41.4
22.6
22.5
9.0
32.3
34.9
22.3
23.5

Table 3: Adolescent’s Gender vs. Favorite Idol’s Gender
Adolescent’s Gender

Idol’s Gender Female Male
Female 510(37.4%) 56(20.4%)
Male 852(62.6%) 218(79.6%)

gender of adolescents and idols are associated (x^d) = 29.16,p < 0.01). Female adolescents appear to prefer male idols (62.6%) to female idols (37.4%), whereas this phenomenon is the same for male adolescents, whose favorite idols also are more male (79.%) than female (20.4%). On the other hand, male adolescents adore male idols more (79.6%) than do female adolescents (62.6%).

579

We next analyzed the association between adolescents’ gender and
the types of favorite idols. As shown in Table 4, when the idol is female,
adolescents’ gender and idol types are not associated (x (̂5) = 1.32, p
> 0.5). However, when the idol is male (see Table 5), adolescents’
gender is significantly related to the idol tjT)es (x (̂5) = 27.54, p

<

0.01). Table 5 shows that female adolescents worship more male media
stars (69.2%) than do males (51.8%). By contrast, male adolescents
worship more male politicians (7.3%) and more fictitious characters
(19.3%) than do females (2.8% for politicians and 13.1% for fictitious
characters).

Overall, the result is in line with that of Raviv et al. (1996)—that
most of the male and female adolescents choose a male media star as
their favorite rather than a female and rather than other types of
idols. Despite the consistency between male and female adolescents’
selections, the psychological processes are supposed to be distinct from
each other. The findings for the female might be due to the fact that
male media stars provide a safe and convenient romantic attachment
for female adolescents (Adams-Price & Greene, 1990; Kamiol, 2001),
whereas identification attachment accounts for males’ worship of male
media stars (Adams-Price & Greene, 1990). Furthermore, when consid-
ering the absolute numbers in Tables 4 and 5, we found only 21 female
fictitious idols (vs. 154 male fictitious idols) and only 9 female politi-
cians (vs. 40 male politicians). The differences may refiect gender in-
equality in the virtual world and in the political field.

Underlying Idol Traits that Attract Adolescents
Because there are eight causes for worshipping idols, the next analy-

sis revealed the major dimensions of variation between these reasons
for worship. We defined the dichotomous items of reasons to worship
as ordinal and thus applied categorical principal components analysis
for quantifying the observed reasons. Table 6 summarizes the results.
Four meaningful dimensions, accounting for 69% of the variance, were
retained to represent ioxa latent idol traits that attract adolescents.

On the first dimension, “good-looking,” “attractive dressing,” and
“attractive body shape” have high and positive component loadings (a

ll

other worship causes have mediocre positive loadings). We refer to this
dimension as “exterior.” By contrast, the second dimension “interior,”
refiecting idols’ inside virtues,” correlates mainly with “humorous and
funny,” “knowledgeable and clever,” “civic-minded and caring,” and
“good-looking,” “attractive dressing,” “attractive body shape,” in oppo-
site directions, while having little relation with “rich” and “sporty.”
This pattern suggests that idols with a high score on “interior” have a

580

Table 4: Adolescent

Female Idol Type
Media Stars
Politicians
Intellectual
Entrepreneur
Non-Celebrities
Fictitious Characters

‘s Gender vs. Female
Adolescent’s Gender

Female
350(68.6%)

8(1.6%)
24 (4.7%)
27 (5.3%)
83 (16.3%)
18(3.5%)

Idol Type

Male
40(71.4%)

1 0-8%)
3 (5.4%)
2 (3.6%)
7 (12.5%)
3 (5.4%)

Table 5: Adolescent’s Gender vs. Male Idol

Male Idol Type
Media Stars
Politicians
Intellectual
Entrepreneur
Non-Celebrities
Fictitious Characters

Adolescent’s Gender
Female

590 (69.2%) 1
24 (2.8%)
37 (4.3%)
34 (4.0%)
55 (6.5%)

Type

Male
13(51.8%)
16 (7.3%)
12 (5.5%)
15(6.9%)
20 (9.2%)

112(13.1%) 42(19.3%)

Table 6: Component Loadings of Worship Reasons on

Worship Reason
Good-looking
Attractive dressing
Attractive body shape
Humorous and funny
Knowledgeable and

clever
Civic-minded and

caring
Rich
Sporty

Eigenvalue
% of Variance Explained

Exterior
0.654
0.736
0.727
0.433
0.302

0.473

0.393
0.389
2.31
28.8

Idol
Interior
-0.375
-0.275
-0.319
0.546
0.611

0.541

-0.054
0.062
1.29
16.1

Trait
Wealth
-0.239
-0.090
-0.022
-0.304
0.306

-0.194

0.828
0.115
0.99
12.3

Idol Traits

Athlete
-0.088
-0.180
-0.118
0.179
-0.399

-0.044

0.040
0.833
0.94
11.8

581

high score on “humorous and funny,” “knowledgeable and clever,” and
“civic-minded and caring,” and a low score on “good-looking,” “attrac-
tive dressing,” and “attractive body shape.” “Wealth,” the third dimen-
sion, reveals a contrast between “rich,” “knowledgeable and clever,”
and “humorous and funny.” Adolescents consider that wealthy idols
are clever while also serious. The fourth dimension, “athlete,” contrasts
between “sporty” and “knowledgeable and clever.”

The above analyses raise two issues. First, all reasons for idolization
are positively loaded on the trait “exterior.” This pattern implies that
good-looking idols with attractive body shapes and wearing attractive
apparel are rich, sporty, and also have good virtue. Could the “perfect
idol” be merely an illusion? The “perfect idol syndrome” might be at-
tributed to the halo effect of idols’ brilliant images. Second, the “inte-
rior” trait contrasts between idols’ good virtue and outside images,
the ‘Svealth” contrasts between rich and humorous, and the “athlete”
contrasts between sporty and knowledgeable. Are those patterns reali-
ties or only stereotypes assigned to idols? Collectively, adolescents’
evaluations of idols appear to be dominated by the halo emitted by
idols’ surface images. When these images are not prominent, adoles-
cents seem to choose idols by stereot3nping. To facilitate subsequent
analyses, latent traits scores were calculated respectively for each re-
spondent’s favorite idol.

How are different Idol Types Evaluated on Idol Traits and Worship
Levels?

We then conducted a MANOVA to examine how adolescents evaluate
the six idol types on the four underlying idol traits as a whole. The
results indicate that the six types show significantly different overall
traits (Wilks’s lambda = 0.66; Pillai’s trace = 0.38; Hotelhng’s trace
= 0.48; allps < 0.01). We then conducted four independent univariate ANOVAs on these four traits, and the results show that different types of idols are considered differently on these traits, respectively (all ps < 0.01). Tuke/s HSD post hoc comparisons were analyzed to deter- mine the subtle differences. Table 7 summarizes the comparison re- sults.

Media stars are regarded as having more favorable exteriors than
any other types of idols. However, media stars exhibit a less pleasing
interior and are less affluent than most other types of idols. Entrepre-
neurs, unsurprisingly, are the wealthiest across the six idol types,
while noncelebrities have the highest interior trait. Interestingly, fic-
titious characters are thought of as being much wealthier and having
a better interior than media stars.

582

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ANOVAs on the worship levels show that the six types of idols are
worshiped with different intensities {F{5, 1630) = 8.62, p < 0.01. Tu- key's HSD post hoc tests (see Tahle 7) indicate that media stars are worshiped more intensely than intellectuals, entrepreneurs, and ficti- tious idols. We speculate that this phenomenon might he due to the intensive commercial manipulation to promote media idols (Giles, 2000).

Factors that Influence the Intensity of Worship Levels
A regression model was conducted to assess how well the set of idol

traits explain adolescents’ worship levels. As discussed, gender-dissim-
ilarity-attraction and idol t3T)es are hoth critical variables that influ-
ence adolescents’ worship hehaviors; thus we also include these two
variables in the regression model. Grender difference was coded as a
dummy variable with one indicating a different gender hetween the
adolescent and idol. The idol type is also coded as a dummy variable
with one indicating that the tĵ je of the adolescent’s favorite idol is a
media star. Worship levels were then regressed on gender difference,
idol type, exterior, interior, wealthy and athlete. Table 8 shows the
regression results.

As can be seen in Table 8, except for the interior trait, all indepen-
dent variables are significantly related to worship levels. We found

Table 8: Regression

Independent Variables
Difference in Gender
between Adolescent and Idol
Idol Type: Media Star
Idol Trait: Exterior
Idol Trait: Interior
Idol Trait: Wealth
Idol Trait: Athlete

R Square
Adjusted R Square
F-value (6,1629)

Results of Worship Levels
Dependent Variable:

Worship Level
Standardized Coefficients

0.07*** (2.78)

0.06″ (2.12)
0.26″‘ (10.92)

0.04(1.58)
-0.10′” (-3.91)
0.10′” (4.12)

0.108
0.104

32.74″‘
Note: t-values in parentheses.

*><0.05 **><0.01

584

that differences in sex between adolescents and their favorite idols was
associated with adolescents’ heightened worship levels. Adolescents
are more likely to be fascinated with their idols when he/she is a media
star or is attractive for the exterior or athlete traits. However, the
worship levels are negatively correlated with the wealth trait, but are
not associated with the interior trait.

We could derive further implications from the worship pattern exhib-
ited by the model. First, though the four underlying idol traits appear
to be positive in nature, their impacts on adolescents’ worship levels
are nonsymmetrical. While the traits of exterior and athlete are wor-
ship facilitators, the wealth trait is a prohibitor. Unexpectedly, the
interior traits is neutral from adolescents’ perspectives. Next, similar
to the finding of Raviv et al. (1996), the exterior trait is the most
important factor in adolescents’ worship intensity. In combination with
the illusory exterior (as discussed, the composition of exterior trait
implies perfect idol illusion) and indeterminate interior, adolescents’
worship behaviors appear to be nonrational. In other words, idolization
may be related to materialism, which emphasizes the right image and
possessions (Engle & Kasser, 2005), and adolescents may choose ideal-
ism (vs. realism) and romanticism (vs. rationalism) in selecting idols
(Yue & Cheung, 2000).

CONCLUSIONS

To explore adolescents’ idol adoration behavior, we collected 1,636
samples from 13 senior high schools across Taiwan. The results show:
(a) over half of the adolescents adore gender idols that are different
from themselves. The results also show that most female and male
adolescents’ favorite idols are male. Specifically, female adolescents
tend to worship more male media stars than do male adolescents, while
male adolescents worship more male politicians and more fictitious
characters than do female adolescents, (b) To explore the reasons for
idolization, the four idol traits that attract adolescents—exterior, inte-
rior, wealth, and athlete—^were retained in this study. Interestingly,
we found that those respondents tend to stereots^pe their idols. For
example, adolescents thought that media stars would have a more
favorable exterior trait, but would have less of an interior trait, entre-
preneurs make up the wealthiest group, and noncelebrities have the
highest interior trait, (c) The idolization level differs between idol types
and provide different reasons for worship. The worship levels intensify
when idols are media stars or when adolescents are attracted by an

585

idol’s exterior trait. However, the idolization levels are negatively cor-
related with the wealth trait and are not associated with the interior
trait.

Adolescents tend to establish a positive self-identity and social iden-
tity through idolization (Cheng, 1997; Raviv et al., 1996). Self-categori-
zation often occurs in the process of searching for an identity (Turner,
1987). Our findings imply that adolescents mainly classify themselves
and their favorite idols using the exterior trait, which intensified idol-
ization hehaviors. Compared with the social value that often empha-
sizes an individual’s interior trait, it seems that the trait of exterior is
not a good basis for establishing adolescents’ self-identity. Adolescents’
selection of an idol is probably market-driven and media-determined
(Yue & Cheung, 2000), and technology might be blamed for the spread
of these delusional beliefs within the youth culture (Showalter, 1997).
These behaviors based on idols’ exterior traits may prevent adolescents
from seeking information regarding other idols who are not exterior-
oriented, thus increasing the stereotyping of those idols (i.e., those who
are interior, wealthy, or athlete-oriented).

As individuals’ idol worship attitudes and behaviors are negatively
correlated with their cognitive abilities, such as critical thinking and
creativity (McCutcheon, Ashe, Houran, & Maltby, 2003), one plausible
explanation for our finding of distorted idol worship behavior is adoles-
cents’ cognitive deficits. Adolescents may be relatively low in cognitive
functioning, which causes them to more easily accept commercial and
materialistic messages (Engle & Kasser, 2005), thus precluding them
from admiring an idol’s interior. Adolescents’ idol adoration behaviors
also infiuence their consuming behaviors (Chiou, Huang, & Chuang,
2005) and sometimes have detrimental effects on their mental and
physical health (Maltby, Giles, Barber, & McCutcheon, 2005). In addi-
tion, adolescents may select idols as their epistemic authorities on
whom they rely in accumulating knowledge or forming values (Engle &
Kasser, 2005; Raviv et al., 1996). Since this reliance is likely to be
connected to adolescents’ delinquent behaviors (Chan et al., 1998), edu-
cators should stress the importance of idolization behaviors, and make
the public aware of mass media manipulation of adolescents’ cogni-
tive deficits.

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