ABSTRACT
Worship Scale, which was designed to measure the intensity of IDENTIFICATION, that is, the strength with which they associate their own identity with that of the celebrity. The research team that devised it concludes that, at the end of the scale, there is absorption, which involves a total commitment of all available ‘‘perceptual, motoric, imaginative and ideational resources to a unified representation of the attention object’’ (motoric refers to movement; ideational refers to the capacity to form ideas). The fan might be motivated to learn more and more about their chosen celebrity, perhaps seeking out obscure sources of information that are not available to most fans, or they may resort to other behavior. Skater Katarina Witt and tennis player Steffi Graf are among the
many celebrity athletes to have attracted fans at this end of the scale. Witt was inundated with mail and unwelcome phone calls. Graf ’s absorbed fan stabbed her rival Monica Seles as a way of protecting Graf ’s status as the number-one player in the rankings. Several other celebrity athletes have been subject to similarly motivated fans, more popularly known as stalkers.
