New psychology research links obsessive celebrity worship to criminal thinking

New research published in Deviant Behavior indicates that an intense obsession with celebrities tends to go hand in hand with criminal thinking patterns and vulnerable narcissism. The findings provide evidence that the darker sides of celebrity worship are closely tied to a deeply insecure form of self-centeredness and a willingness to justify rule-breaking behavior.

Celebrity worship describes a one-sided, parasocial relationship where an individual becomes intensely attached to a public figure. This behavior exists on a spectrum. On the milder end, people might simply enjoy discussing their favorite actors or musicians with friends for entertainment. On the extreme end, the attachment takes on addictive qualities, leading individuals to obsessively track a celebrity’s life at the expense of their own daily functioning.

Narcissism, a personality trait characterized by an extreme focus on oneself, plays a central role in how these obsessions develop. Psychologists generally divide narcissism into two subtypes: grandiose and vulnerable. People with grandiose narcissism tend to be arrogant, aggressive, and highly self-assured, believing they are superior to others. In contrast, those with vulnerable narcissism suffer from deep insecurities, anxiety, and a constant fear of inadequacy, often reacting to threats with hostility or withdrawal.

Recent explorations of this insecure personality type, such as a study covered by PsyPost in 2025, have found that vulnerable narcissism is consistently rooted in anxious childhood attachment styles. These individuals often struggle to form healthy connections in real life. Because of this social anxiety, people with high levels of vulnerable narcissism seem particularly drawn to idolizing famous figures. A parasocial relationship offers a sense of connection without the fear of real-world rejection.

The relationship between extreme celebrity worship and harmful behavior has been documented for years. A 2007 study provided early evidence that pathological celebrity worshippers exhibit higher rates of criminal tendencies, sometimes showing a willingness to break the law if their idol asked them to. Separately, psychologists have explored how narcissistic traits fuel rule-breaking. A 2021 study demonstrated that distinguishing between grandiose and vulnerable narcissism helps explain the psychological mechanisms that lead people to commit crimes.

More recent work has started connecting these overlapping personality traits. A 2025 study showed that people with vulnerable narcissism are uniquely prone to obsessing over celebrities, while arrogant, grandiose narcissists are not. Building on this progression of research, Joshua L. Williams, a professor and chair of criminal justice and criminology at Georgia Southern University, along with Leanne Confer of the University of Michigan, Flint, and Madeleine Krueger and Lawrence Locker, Jr. of Georgia Southern University, designed a new study to test how these elements interact.

The researchers wanted to see if celebrity worship and the two distinct types of narcissism independently relate to criminal thinking, which includes attitudes that justify illegal acts or ignore the harm caused to victims.

“While some early research, back in 2007, established a basic connection between celebrity worship and personality characteristics associated with criminality, very little empirical work since then explored how celebrity worship relates specifically to criminal thinking patterns,” the researchers told PsyPost. “Furthermore, previous research on personality and crime overwhelmingly focused on grandiose narcissism, leaving a significant gap concerning how vulnerable narcissism relates to both celebrity worship and criminal thinking styles.”

To investigate this, the research team recruited 237 undergraduate students from a large university in the southeastern United States. The participants had an average age of 21, and the group was primarily composed of female students. Through an online survey, the students completed several established psychological questionnaires designed to measure their attitudes and personality traits.

The survey included a measure to assess where participants fell on the spectrum of celebrity worship, from basic entertainment and social interest to intense personal connection and borderline-pathological obsession. To capture narcissistic traits, the researchers used two separate tools: one focused on the confident, superiority-driven traits of grandiose narcissism, and another focused on the defensive, insecure traits of vulnerable narcissism. Finally, the participants answered questions evaluating six categories of criminal thinking, such as a desire for power, a tendency to justify bad behavior, and insensitivity to the impact of crime on others.

When analyzing the data, the researchers found that the two types of narcissism related to celebrity worship in very different ways. As expected from previous research, vulnerable narcissism was reliably associated with higher levels of celebrity worship across the board. The more insecure and anxious participants were, the more intensely they obsessed over their favorite stars. Grandiose narcissism, however, showed no statistical relationship with celebrity worship.

“Furthermore, individuals who struggle with vulnerable narcissism, characterized by anxiety, low self-esteem, and social avoidance, tend to be particularly prone to forming these obsessive parasocial relationships, likely as a maladaptive coping strategy to manage daily distress and identity-development challenges,” the researchers explained.

Both forms of narcissism were linked to criminal thinking, but the patterns diverged. Grandiose narcissism was primarily associated with a desire for power, a sense of personal grandiosity, and a lack of sensitivity to how crimes affect victims. Vulnerable narcissism, on the other hand, predicted a much broader range of antisocial attitudes. It was strongly tied to nearly every category of criminal thinking measured, indicating that the insecurity and hostility characteristic of this trait may foster a widespread acceptance of deviant behavior.

“It was interesting to see that the vulnerable subtype of narcissism continued to be a consistent and strong predictor of celebrity worship, which fits with our previous work,” Williams and his colleagues noted. “However, now we show that the vulnerability associated with that subtype of narcissism, more so than the grandiose subtype, may also be predictive of criminal thinking styles. The consistency of the findings related to vulnerable narcissism underscores its importance to understanding constructs such as celebrity worship and criminal thinking styles in greater detail.”

The data also indicated a strong association between celebrity worship and criminal thinking. The nature of this relationship depended heavily on the intensity of the participant’s obsession. At the lowest level of celebrity engagement, where people simply use celebrities as a topic of social conversation, participants actually showed lower levels of grandiosity and greater sensitivity to the impacts of crime. This suggests that casual, entertainment-focused interest in celebrities is largely harmless and even associated with more pro-social attitudes.

“To prevent misinterpretation, readers should not assume that all forms of celebrity interest are harmful,” the researchers pointed out. “In this study, the entertainment-social level (the lowest level) of celebrity worship was actually predictive of lower criminal thinking and higher social desirability.”

The opposite was true for the more extreme forms of celebrity worship. Participants who scored high in borderline-pathological worship demonstrated a much stronger endorsement of criminal thinking. They were more likely to justify rule-breaking, seek out power and revenge, and disregard the harm caused by illegal actions. Even when the researchers mathematically controlled for both types of narcissism, intense celebrity worship independently predicted these criminal thinking styles.

“Intense, obsessive celebrity worship (the highest levels) is not merely harmless fandom,” they added. “It was only the extreme, obsessive, and borderline-pathological levels of celebrity worship that tended to align with problematic traits and cognitive styles.” Ultimately, the team concluded that “a person’s relationship with celebrities, especially when the relationship is borderline pathological, can be deeply tied to their underlying personality traits and cognitive patterns.”

“Readers should note that the correlations between celebrity worship and criminal thinking styles range from weak to moderate, with the strongest associations emerging at the highest, most obsessive levels of celebrity worship,” the authors said. “In our regression models, the combination of celebrity worship levels and narcissism subtypes accounted for 13% to 30% of the variance across various criminal thinking categories. While these effects demonstrate a meaningful statistical relationship, they also indicate that these psychological traits exist as part of a larger, highly complex web of factors that may influence criminal thinking.”

There are a few things to keep in mind regarding these findings. Because the study relied on cross-sectional data collected at a single point in time, the researchers cannot determine the direction of cause and effect. It is possible that vulnerable narcissism drives people toward celebrity obsession, but it is also possible that extreme parasocial relationships alter how people view themselves and the rules of society.

“Our long-term goal is to transition from cross-sectional designs to longitudinal studies, which would allow us to map out the specific developmental pathways and determine if narcissism drives criminal thinking through celebrity worship,” the researchers said.

The study does have some limitations regarding its sample as well. The participants were entirely composed of college students, a demographic that may not accurately represent the general public or individuals who have actually been involved in the criminal justice system. Future studies tracking these behaviors over time, or examining populations with a history of documented offending, could help clarify how these personality traits and obsessions translate into real-world behavior.

“We also aim to expand our research beyond college students to forensic samples, such as individuals with histories of arrest or incarceration, to see how these cognitive styles translate into actual offending behaviors,” the researchers added. “Finally, we plan to examine how self-control acts as a moderating factor within these relationships.”

The study, “Celebrity Worship, Narcissism, and Criminal Thinking Styles,” was authored by Joshua L. Williams, Leanne Confer, Madeleine Krueger, and Lawrence Locker Jr.