Romance and abstinence attract teen girls to Twilight

Romance and abstinence attract teen girls to Twilight series

By Laura Stone , Canwest News Service

Vampires aside, it's really just a simple love story.


The reason teenage girls have fallen hard for the Twilight book and film series has to do with its portrayal of a traditional, romantic relationship, new research from the University of Missouri shows.


In the series, vampire Edward Cullen doesn't want to harm or bite his teen love interest Bella Swan, which means they can't have sex.


"With teens, we actually found that they appreciated the messages of abstinence," said Melissa Click, an assistant professor of communication who surveyed 4,000 Twilight fans, aged 11 to 70.


Click and her co-authors' research primarily addresses the reasons behind the teenage-madness for Twilight, a four-book series with two films so far.


The newest movie, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, opens Friday, and has already busted Cineplex Theatres' records by selling $1.5 million in advance tickets across Canada. The first film, Twilight, grossed more than $190 million in North American revenues.


The Missouri research found that many teen girls — who make up the core of Twilight's audience, along with a few moms — are drawn to the story about love beyond the physical.


"The media environment is saturated with teens in sexual relationships," said Click, who plans to publish the findings next spring in a collaborative book Bitten by Twilight: Youth culture, media and the vampire franchise.


"(Twilight) does provide something different for girls. I've had girls say to me, 'I'm going to wait for my Edward.' And they think that's really cool."


Her colleague, Jennifer Stevens Aubrey, called the series a "backlash to the 'hooking-up' culture."


Edward represents an anomaly in the minds of many teenage girls. He's romantic, protective, and most important, cares deeply for who Bella is, and not just what she looks like.


And for 18-year-old Twilight fan France-Renee Miron, that's a good thing.


"Most boys now around our age, all they want is to get you in bed. They don't care about the romance part," said Miron, who is from Green Valley, Ont.


"In the book and in the film, (Edward) doesn't want to have sex. It's really different."


Miron's friend, Valerie Lefebvre, 18, said she found solace in the book's messages about abstinence.


"By reading the book we find out we're not the only ones who could have a good relationship without being sexually active," said Lefebvre.


Click said that many girls interviewed felt a sense of relief that Bella and Edward couldn't yet have sex.


"They liked that it was the man putting the brakes on sexual activity. For them it probably highlighted the development of the relationship — the romantic relationship — between the two, instead of the sexual relationship," said Click.


The study is comprised of online surveys and in-person focus groups. Researchers found 70 teens for the focus groups at a fan convention held in Dallas last summer. About one-third of those surveyed were teens.


Despite an increasingly sexualized youth culture, the desire for romance among teenage girls has remained, said Mike Farrell, a partner at Toronto youth research firm Youthography.


"There are some fundamental things that haven't changed that much. And one of those, especially with girls, is the focus on a search for meaningful love that is hopeful, passionate, real," he said.


According to Youthography research, only a quarter of young teenage girls were interested in sex, while more than half said they thought about marriage and having children.


In a 2008 Canada-wide study, Youthography surveyed around 500 teen girls ages 14 to 18 about 50 different "values" affecting them, from current events to sex. They've been tracking values for research for the past nine years as part of Youthography's quarterly study called, Ping.


But there can be a danger to Twilight's traditional romance story too, say experts.


University of Victoria political science professor Janni Aragon said that the books, while she enjoys them, enforce "good old gender stereotypes," such as Bella being clumsy and Edward acting condescending and all-knowing.


There's also the message that Edward doesn't trust himself around Bella.


"Woven within these pages is also that boys get to a certain point in which you can't tell them 'no,' or they can't control themselves. And I'm not sure an 11-, 12-, 13-year-old, maybe even a 15- to 18-year-old, understands that."


Xania Khan, editor-in-chief of Toronto's Vervegirl teen magazine, said that the hysteria surrounding Twilight may blind teens to real-world relationships.


"Some girls have a hard time distinguishing fact and fiction," said Khan. "They might look for something that's not real."


That won't be a problem for Miron and Lefebvre's friend, Embrun, Ont.'s Marjolaine Bourdeau, also 18. While she said she's a fan of the books, Bourdeau won't be waiting on a perfect vampire boyfriend anytime soon.


"I know that's not possible," she said. "Girls who haven't been in a real relationship. They don't know what relationships are like."