Are you obsessed with everything Taylor Swift does? Do you check daily how Justin and Hailey are doing? Is your favorite TV show The Kardashians? Then you might not be pleased to know that, according to new research, people obsessed with celebrities and their lives are less smart.
A Hungarian study, published in BMC Psychology, found “a direct association between celebrity worship and lower performance in cognitive tests.”
The research was conducted through a survey of 1,763 adults who completed a series of tasks, including a vocabulary and logic test. Respondents then filled out a questionnaire created to determine how interested they were in celebrities.
Participants had to answer yes or no to a series of statements, including: “I often feel compelled to know the personal habits of my favorite celebrity” and “I am obsessed with the details of my favorite celebrity.”
Researchers found that those who scored high on interest in stars also had lower performance in the two cognitive ability tests.
However, they acknowledged that they could not say whether an obsession with celebrity culture was a cause or consequence of lower cognitive abilities.
The research does not establish cause and effect, nor does it mean that knowing the timeline of JLo and Ben Affleck’s relationship makes people less intelligent.
According to experts, “these results align with previous findings on addictive behaviors, suggesting that excessive obsessions can compromise cognitive functioning due to increased focus and energy invested in the behavior dominating the person’s life.”
“Future studies should seek additional support for our hypothesis that the cognitive effort invested in keeping up with celebrity gossip may interfere with the person’s performance in tasks that require attention and other cognitive skills,” the researchers said.
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