A University of Kentucky psychologist reviewed the lyrics of the top 10 songs from 1980 to 2007 and found evidence of our increasing narcissism. Pop music now includes more first-person singular pronouns (I, me, mine), while first-person plural pronouns (we, us, our) declined. Even words conveying positive emotions like “love,” “nice,” and “sweet” are decreasing in favor of words about anger like “hate,” “kill,” and “damn.” The researchers claims this mirrors “recent evidence showing increases in U.S. loneliness and psychopathology over time.”
Sadly, the report was completed before Britney Spears’ Femme Fatale could be analyzed for evidence of society’s increasing stupidity. Even the biggest Britney fan must admit that the lyrics, “Your body looks so sick, I think I caught the flu” and “Got me kind of hot but I ain’t sweatin’ you, Steaming like a pot full of vegetables” are frighteningly dumb.
Song Lyrics Reflect Our Narcissistic Age [Miller-McCune]