The U.S. might want to take cues from the medical community down under. The Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons thinks teenagers should be banned from getting cosmetic procedures like breast augmentation and liposection. Queensland recently passed such a law, and the Society hopes all other Australian states and territories will follow suit.

As I pointed out in an earlier post, thousands of girls under 18 in the United States went under the knife for breast augmentation in 2007. Is plastic surgery like this something we want to allow, if girls aren’t necessarily fully developed, physically or emotionally? Here’s an interesting article evaluating Australia’s decision, and a resource for teens (and their parents) contemplating plastic surgery.

Whenever I’ve had a long, exhausting day of work—when all I want to do is turn off my brain and relax—I’ll watch the Hills. The faux reality TV series, which follows Lauren, Audrina, Heidi and their friends through their lives around L.A., has become a hit on MTV. In a recent MTV interview, actor Charlize Theron wonders why:

“Why is it so big? It’s about nothing! … I think the girls are beautiful and when they cry their mascara runs and that’s real, but I don’t get it!”

The truth is that the Hills is little more than pretty pink fluff. And that’s why viewers love it (myself included). We live in a culture of instant gratification, so it’s no wonder that a “reality” show about beautiful girls flitting from work to lunches to parties in chic outfits and perfect makeup has become so popular. All you have to do is watch the scenes from the next episode to know exactly what’s coming up in the plot. There you have it: instant gratification.

We’re often asked how prevalent certain types of sexual behavior are among teenagers across the nation. How many teens are having sexual intercourse? Oral sex? With how many partners? This month Kaiser Family Foundation put together a fact sheet on the sexual behavior health of teenagers that answers these very questions. It’s a great resource - and wake-up call - for everyone.

Read the full fact sheet here.

Last night on Gossip Girl Serena ordered a Belvedere Vodka Martini with two olives, and then another, as if it were the most normal thing in the world for a high school junior to do. But just last week, MillerCoors was stopped from launching its new caffeinated alcoholic drink, Sparks Red, after attorneys general from 25 states expressed serious concern that the drink was too teen-friendly. Teens already love Red Bull, the attorneys argued; they’ll love something like it even more with alcohol.

Why not hold the CW network, which airs Gossip Girl, to the same ethical standard as MillerCoors? I’m not saying we should — but what extent does an alcohol manufacturer or a television network have the responsibility to prevent teenage drinking?

Marissa made an important point in her post the other day: “How do we expect young girls to feel confident about their bodies if their mothers are striving for a too-thin ideal?”

Teenage girls are already surrounded by physical perfection—all they have to do is turn on the TV or open a magazine. They’re also growing up in a society where they can buy what they weren’t born with. Want Angelina’s lips? No problem. JLo’s behind? Just sign here. A few years ago, MTV capitalized on our obsession with beauty with “I Want A Famous Face,” a reality show chronicling the stories of young people who received plastic surgery to make them look like their favorite celebrities.

But this pressure to look perfect doesn’t just come from Hollywood; mothers want to look great, too. (Did anyone else notice how waif-like some of the women looked at the Emmy’s last night?) As mommy makeovers become more and more routine, the crucial question is this: How does a mother’s propensity for perfection affect her daughter?

My Beautiful Mommy, a controversial children’s book that came out this past spring, is meant to help little girls and boys understand why mommy just came home with a smaller nose, thinner thighs, and flat abs. There is a deep history behind women’s relationship to beauty and their bodies, so click here to read my Boston Globe op-ed on the book, mothers and daughters, and more.

Today was insanely fun and busy — Abigail and I had nearly 20 radio interviews! Now that the conversations are over and the weekend is just within reach, I’ve been trolling entertainment sites for news… Found this sobering blog on the Los Angeles Times site, about the skinny stars of the new 90210.

US Weekly took similar interest earlier this week when it compared the body shapes of old and new 90210 cast members. Turns out in the new season, there’s a new premium on thinness. But the LA Times takes this observation one step farther by looking at older female characters on television — and finds skeletal 40-something-year-old characters in Saving Grace, Desperate Housewives, and The Closer.

How do we expect young girls to feel confident about their bodies if their mothers are striving for a too-thin ideal, too?

Whether you live in Boston, Colorado Springs, or Toledo, be sure to turn on your radio tomorrow. We’re doing a marathon of interviews! Now that Restless Virgins is out in paperback, we’ll be talking with DJs across America about our book and what it’s like to be a teenager today. So check out our schedule. We may be talking on a radio station in your home city. Tune in!

At the MTV Video Music Awards a couple of weeks ago, “promise” rings created quite a stir. The bands — worn by some teens and young adults who have pledged to remain virgins until marriage — were the subject of much ridicule by comedian and VMA host Russell Brand.

Brand had a particular bone to pick with the ring-bearing Jonas Brothers (above): “It’s a little bit ungrateful because [the Jonas Brothers] could literally have sex with any women they want, but they’re just not going to do it.” The audience was stunned, Jordin Sparks was outraged (”It’s not bad to wear a promise ring because not every guy and a girl wants to be a slut, OK?”) — and even Paris Hilton thought Brand’s ribbing was cruel.

Will promise rings catch on? Britney Spears and Jessica Simpson used to wear them, if that says anything. And in Restless Virgins, Whitney makes a virginity pledge, too — but then sleeps with her boyfriend two weeks later.

For some people, the promise ring is a wonderful thing. But more often than not, it’s not. As one health and expert recently told Reuters, “These abstinence pledges leave people completely unprepared, once they make the decision to become sexually active, and what happens is that we have a society that is sexually illiterate.”

Parents, if you think a co-ed sleepover party is your worst nightmare, consider the latest trend in the sex lives of teenagers in Chile. The New York Times reports:

“The [Bar Urbano disco] is a tangle of lips and tongues and hands, all groping and exploring. About 800 teenagers sway and bounce to lyrics imploring them to “Poncea! Poncea!”: make out with as many people as they can. And make out they do — with stranger after stranger, vying for the honor of being known as the “ponceo,” the one who pairs up the most.”

Some of the students in Restless Virgins went to basement parties on the weekends, where the assumption was that if you showed up, you were going to hook up, and if you hooked up, your friends were going to watch. But this trend among Chilean teens marks a radical departure. What is more, Chile is a notoriously conservative country, where “sex education in public schools is badly lagging, and the pregnancy rate among girls under 15 has been on the rise.” And considering the risk of STDs, this increase in teenage sexual behavior can lead to some serious consequences.

So parents, be glad that your teens don’t live in Chile. But think about this: the very public pregnancies of Jamie Lynne Spears and Bristol Palin, not to mention the eighteen girls in Gloucester (who, like teens in Chile, had little sex ed), all reveal what can happen when teenagers don’t have access to well-rounded sex education. Make sure your teenagers do. And make sure to vote in the upcoming election, because whoever becomes president has the ability to drastically change the way we inform our teens.

The ladies of Sex and the City immortalized it over Sunday brunch. The show Gossip Girl is premised on it. And women around the world have been doing it since they first learned how to have a conversation. Talking is the pastime of female friends, and now it has some psychologists worried. From a recent New York Times article:

“[R]ecently female friendship and girl talk, particularly among adolescents, has drawn growing interest from psychologists and researchers examining the question of how much talking is too much talking. Some studies have found that excessive talking about problems can contribute to emotional difficulties, including anxiety and depression. The term researchers use is “co-rumination” to describe frequently or obsessively discussing the same problem. The behavior is typical among teens — Why didn’t he call? Should I break up with him? And, psychologists say, it has intensified significantly with e-mail, text messaging, instant messaging and Facebook. And in certain cases it can spin into a potentially contagious and unhealthy emotional angst, experts say.”

To learn more, click here.

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