Whiny women, macho men – and that’s it? [29.01.21]
The team media psychology at the annual conference of the section “Rezeptions- und Wirkungsforschung”, January 27th to 29th 2021.
We all know the typical roles of men and women in movies – whether it be the sensitive Bridget Jones or the unapproachable James Bond. We suffer with them, feel happy for them, and understand exactly how they feel. But what happens when movie characters appear beyond the stereotypical expectations of their gender?
Our student Laura Vogt answered this question with her bachelor thesis. With a complex experiment, she managed to dissentangle the effects of biological sex (am I a man or a woman) and psychosocial gender (how feminine or masculine do I feel).
One part of her sample saw movie scenes that showed characters in their typical roles: A submissive female job applicant, a tough male lawyer. The other part saw untypical characters: A young, attractive women goes into confrontation with a dubious investor, and a single dad crys tears of joy when being offered a job that could potentially bring him and his son out of their misery.
The results show that self-identified gender role has an impact on the identification with the characters: Recipients (both male and female) who describe themselves with many feminine attributes (e.g. soft, emotional, caring), identify more with the typical female or the nontypical male characters, i.e. characters with a feminine gender role concept. Recipients with a masculine self-concept, on the other hand, identify more with the nontypical female character – the women with a more masculine attitude.
The study shows how important it is to assess both biological sex and psychosocial gender in empirical studies. It further contributes to understanding the identification with movie characters, which is what every movie producer ultimately wants to enable.
At the conference, Laura Vogt presented the results with her supervisor Regine Frener in the panel on “stereotypes, gender and incivility” next to other novel contributions.
The conference, which came under the motto “#RezFoForFuture“, had the focus on research on sustainability. It starte with a key note from astrophysician Harald Lesch, who explained his perspective on the importance of science communication – especially under the current circumstances.
The team media psychology is happy to have been part of the amazing conference and thanks the hosts from the Ludwigs-Maximilian-Universität Munich for their great organisation and communication.
