Apparently, kids demonstrate their parents' bad habits when they play with their Barbie dolls.
From thestar.com:
During a role-playing scenario with study investigators, one six-year-old boy offered a Barbie doll the newspaper and cigarettes with the words: "Have some smokes. Do you like smokes? I like smokes."You'd think this would actually be working in the opposite direction. With Barbie's pervasive influence, I'm surprised the kids aren't forcing plastic shoes onto their parent's feet, twisting their hair into glitter streaked braids, grabbing mom and dad by the waist and walking them around the house on imaginary shopping trips, pressing their faces together for that classic nose-crushing Ken and Barbie kiss.
4 comments:
honey, that only happens in our house...the kisses, the shopping trips, the braids, the crack pipes, um i mean, the plastic shoes...
I love it - another study to scientifically determine the incredibly obvious, that a "...process of imitation, which typically involves shifts in attitudes and expectations about the behaviour, begins at a very young age..." No shit, Sherlock.
I love your image of kids moving their parents around like giant dolls. Could be your follow up to "You will Behave."
Cheri, You'd think the plastic shoes really were crack pipes with the effect thy seem to have on our daughter.
Thanks Sharon. I hope to leave Barbie dolls alone for a little while now, but who knows? Your comment made me think about the real implication of my little joke.
Children moving their parents around like giant dolls. In some way that is what they are doing when they play with Barbies and action figures. In the real world, their own lives are controlled and manipulated by all the adults around them, but when they play they get to turn the tables and take control of those who control them. There's an interesting influence feedback loop there.
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