Instead it contributed to an outbreak of inflammatory rhetoric about adolescent promiscuity and a teen pregnancy epidemic. Even though Tanner's contemporaries, like historian Vern Bullough, immediately questioned the study's accuracy, it was snatched up by Newsweek, Time and the Nation, among others. The danger was not randy boys, but Lolita girls. Fast-forward a decade and Newsweek runs the same story. By 1999, Newsweek hits its stride.
Blame is dispersed.
Newsweek does not manage to provide proof that early bloomers are having intercourse sooner or that absentee moms, along with a premature dousing of hormones, are to blame. Probably because it doesn't really exist. They can attract the attention of older, more sexually experienced guys. They can incur fear and guilt and premature leniency or restriction in their parents. In pointing out the difference between social maturation and physical maturation, experts tend to agree that parents and educators need to be sure they are not treating girls who may look sexually mature as though they are more mature.