Justin Bieber Fever Still Hot and Rising

Justin Bieber Fever Still Hot and Rising

Justin Bieber Fever has affected the world. The symptoms include uncontrollable swooning, screaming and spending hours on social networking sites Facebook and Twitter to track down the actor. It primarily affects preteen and teen girls, yet it is highly contagious and can infect mothers, too. In severe cases, sufferers camp out on sidewalks for days. "The appeal for me is, of course, that he's beautiful," says 15-year-old Emma Reeves of Madison, Conn., who has seen Justin Bieber twice in concert.

By disease standards, "Bieber Fever" is approaching a global pandemic with the release of the 18-year-old pop star's latest album, "Believe," last week.

Compared with past outbreaks of fan mania, scientists now have a better understanding of why teens–girls in particular–become so passionate about some musicians, and the recording industry is far more adept at exploiting the phenomenon. Parents of star-struck "Bieliebers"–as his fans are sometimes known–can be assured, experts say, that what looks like mass hysteria is a harmless stage in adolescent development.

Hearing familiar, favorite music stimulates the release of dopamine, the neurotransmitter involved in pleasure and addiction, providing the same rush as eating chocolate or that winning does for a compulsive gambler, says neuroscientist Daniel Levitin, who was able to observe the process using fMRI scans in his lab at McGill University in Montreal.

The songs are carefully calculated to play into young girls' romantic fantasies, from the Beatles' "I Want to Hold Your Hand" to Bieber's latest song "Boyfriend" with lyrics "If I was your boyfriend, I'd never let you go."

Bieber's 23 million followers on Twitter and 44 million fans on Facebook receive almost hourly updates on where he is and what he's thinking, which, accordingly, make young fans swoon and flush with fever.

Posted by James Fried on Wednesday June 27 2012, 5:55 AM EDT. Ref: Yahoo. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under World. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0