It’s not just celebrities who behave like big kids. Young at heart, the Peter Pan syndrome is alive and well in the UK

Posted: 28th October, 2011

Millions of adults are acting like celebs, living like teenagers and wearing ‘young people’s clothes’ - all while fulfilling their commitments with a childlike humour.

So is it the Peter Andres, Jamie Olivers, Davina McCalls and Holly Willoughbys of the celebrity world who are showing us how to handle responsibilities such as parenthood with our teenage impulses, bucking the natural forces of adulthood which should make us more serious?

Certainly, over the past 50 years, our celebrity role models have changed and regardless of fame, fortune or friends in high places, nearly half of all British adults now admit to living life as though they were a teenager. Indeed, according to new research by Barratts sweets, three quarters of us, regardless of how old we are, still feel like big kids.

Furthermore, while turning 18 might be when we legally become an adult, with reaching 21 seen as significant in terms of ‘coming of age’, the study shows that in 2011, we now don’t actually feel like grown-ups until the ripe old age of 28. A third admit they don’t think they’ll ever really feel like a proper grown-up - even when they have kids of their own, with parents admitting to prancing around to pop music, eating alphabet spaghetti and drooling over young celebrities.

Peter Pan syndrome seems to have taken hold of the over 40s in particular, with two thirds of adults still admitting to enjoying children’s TV shows with their kids. Additionally, 30% of them are still confident they can get away with wearing ‘young people’s’ clothes, while one in ten still ring their parents to ask them how to cook and do household chores.
A staggering 70% of over 40s think they look younger than they actually are and more than 90% can’t believe how old they are, which is probably why nearly half of those surveyed for the study by Barratt Sweets are usually in denial when another birthday comes along.

So are our teenage impulses good for us, or should we just grow up and leave the celebs to their immature ways? Is it healthy to act as we feel and not how one ought to act? Judi James on the podcast below tells us more.

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