Stardoll links up with Childline in How U Feelin? Campaign

Anyone who’s had a teenage daughter will understand how the onset of puberty and can change your lovely compliant lass into an angry or sullen, mistrustful, confused and rebellious stranger, seemingly unable to communicate with you. According to a recent ChildLine survey, the number of children saying they felt stressed most of the time was more than double as they reached their teens, from 12% of 11-13-year-olds to 27% of 14-16-year-olds.

We’ve written a lot about how teens and tweens online social networking is frankly scarey, with its dangers from pornography, predators and cyberbullying.  Refreshingly, there’s now  a case of a social network reaching out to its users and extending a medium for young teen girls to express their feelings.

Stardoll, the social network for teen and tween girls, has partnered with ChildLine to encourage them to share their feelings via a range of online services. Each user of the site will be given a virtual green telephone. When they click on it, it will link them to the ChildLine site.

The Childline site offers children tools to express their feelings through poems, pictures and emoticon-type ‘moodies’ to keep track of their feelings. Children can also contact ChildLine-qualified counsellors through phone, online chat, email and text.

A Moodi Wear Label competition will encourage users to respond to a weekly brief by creating a design based on an emotion. According to Ian MacArthur, NSPCC creative director and head of brand marketing, more than 227,042 girls reported how they felt in the first two weeks of the ‘moodies’ and How U Feelin? campaign on Stardoll and they expect to double that interaction in the coming weeks.