Is the bad behavior of today's pop twits legitimate enough reason to keep your daughter away from I Know Who Killed Me? Or is Newsweek's latest cover, "The Girls Gone Wild Effect," another example of media-manufactured alarmism?

According to the mag's new poll, 77 percent of respondents said Britney, Paris, and Lindsay have too much influence on young girls. (Perhaps that's what happens when you put them on the cover of a national news magazine.) Here's a quick look at the other data:

• "Sex surveys are notoriously unreliable, but the best available data show that the average age of first sexual intercourse for girls is 17 ... and hasn't changed by more than a few months in 20 years."

• "Smoking and overall drug use among teenage girls have declined in recent years."

• "The overall teenage pregnancy rate in 2002, the most recent available, was down 35 percent from 1990."

• "In the 2004-2005 school year, women earned 57 percent of all bachelor's degrees awarded and 59 percent of master's degrees."

Of course, this could just be a bunch of ivory tower numbers manipulation. What do today's real girls think?

• "My friends and I look at them to laugh at them," explains Emma Boyce, a 17-year-old from New Orleans. "Our lives seem pretty good by comparison. We're not going to rehab like Lindsay."