Secondary Attachments and Adolescent Self Concept 1

This study examined the popular notion that crushes or secondary attachments to celebrity figures are an important aspect o f self-concept development during adolescence. In a repeated measures design, 79 male and female 5th, 8th, and l l th graders and college sophomores completed a set o f personality scales, first describing themselves and later, describing the favorite celebrity. Repeated measures multivariate analyses o f variance (MANOVA) analysis o f self-object congruence revealed no significant main or interaction effects for the type o f attachment, gender, or age o f subject. Significant within subject effects were obtained for the repeated measures factor (self-object congruence). Overall, students perceived their attachment objects to be more agentic, yet less expressive and emotionally vulnerable than themselves. M A N O V A analyses indicated that males and older students perceived their attachment objects to be higher in agency than expressivity, whereas females and younger students perceived their attachment objects to be higher in expressivity than agency. These data indicate that the function served by secondary attachments in the development o f self-concept may be quite similar for adolescent males and females.