Santa, older kids want laptops, younger ones iPads, iPhones

If you're a parent, you're probably already panicking about how to satisfy your children during the season of goodwill hunting for material goods.

I am here to help. For I have just been given the results of a survey conducted for online cashback shopping site Ebates.

It's a survey that delved deep into the complicated covetous minds of kiddies and emerged with fascinating results.

It seems that older kids and younger kids have very different ideas about what Santa should shove in their stockings.

Among the 16- to 18-year-olds, there seems considerable consensus that their one heart's desire is a laptop. Yes, even more than clothes. This was true for both boys and girls.

However, the younger ones seem to be more tortured souls -- unclear, as yet, what possession will bring them most spiritual joy.

Boys aged 13 to 15 are sure they need an iPhone. Girls of the same age would much rather have clothes.

Oddly, those between 10 to 12 of both sexes again plump for a laptop.

But those who ages merely consist of a single figure have singularly alternative desires.

For these fledgling of humanity are sure they'd rather have something more portable.

Boys aged 8 to 9 would like an iPad -- preferably the 10-inch version. Girls aged 8 to 9 would most likely choose an iPhone, or maybe some clothes.

Naturally, this is merely a survey of some 1,121 scatterbrained little souls. However, it does suggest that the very young are seeing the future more clearly than those at the age where adulthood is influencing their delicate psyches.

You might wonder, though, whether these little things will be influenced by their heroes and heroines to covet one sort of gadget or another.

This is an especially deep question, given that Microsoft appears to be using some world greats like Jay-Z to push its Windows Phone 8.

You will be stunned into appreciating your own celestial insignificance when I tell you that across all ages, two stars seem to hold the most sway. For girls, it is Taylor Swift. For boys, Justin Bieber.

It is, indeed, a very strange world, one that only sees any hint of change among boys aged between 13 and 15 -- who seem suddenly to adore Bieber's ex, Selena Gomez -- and girls aged 10 to 12, who, quite crazily, adore One Direction.

Dear parent, I have now primed you with as much information as I have at hand. Please remember that any joy you bring to your child will only be temporary.

This is not merely because Apple, Samsung, and the rest will continue to bring out new gizmos at accelerated pace, just to raise the level of inner excitement.

It is because consumerism depends on permanent dissatisfaction.

This is something that La Swift, in particular, has experienced to her great pain, but to music's great benefit.