Most just have incredibly shitty coping skills. Whilst it's true that it does make them feel good to be the centre of attention, mostly it's because they have no idea how to vent the resulting emotions.
Example: Girl's fake acrylic nail breaks off. Screams. Cries. Storms back to nail salon and orders it to be redone. Cries again because it's "just not the same".
Or a more common example: Girl fails test. Cries. Starts accusing teacher of biased marking or goes off at her friend for "flaunting her marks". In reality girl has not even paid attention in class and spent the night before the test on Facebook.