Emotions in Animated Film Media: Do Emotion Portrayals Differ by Character Race?

• In Event: Poster Session 01
  In Poster Session: PS 01 Topic - Race, Ethnicity, Culture, Context

Abstract

People learn about emotions through media and come to prefer the emotions they see in media. Therefore, it is important to understand what emotion messages are provided in media, and whether messages vary by race and ethnicity. Past research has evaluated emotions in storybooks marketed for young children in relation to race and ethnicity. Tsai and colleagues (2007) found that in American books, characters showed excitement and wider smiles, whereas in Taiwanese books, characters showed calmness and eyes closed. Grady and colleagues (2018) found that books with Asian characters contained more content and curiosity displays, books with Hispanic and Latino characters contained more happy displays, books with Black characters contained more love displays, and books with White characters contained more dislike and worry displays. Past research that has considered behaviors modeled in children’s film media examined constructs other than discrete emotions, such as prosocial behaviors (Padilla-Walker et al., 2013) and gender stereotypes (England et al., 2011). The present study addressed this gap in the literature by examining the emotions displayed by characters in popular race-specific films targeted for children.

We selected films that were animated, marketed for children, produced after 2000, and considered popular (e.g., films that won awards, films on Rotten Tomatoes top animated films list). Twenty films were identified, with five films depicting a main character in each racial group (Asian, Hispanic/Latino, White, and Black). Scenes were identified based on characters engaging in a new behavior, shifts in setting, and background music (England et al., 2011). We scored each scene for the presence and intensity of discrete emotions using a coding manual that included positive emotions (happy, love, curiosity, and surprise), negative powerful emotions (anger and dislike), negative powerless emotions (sad, fear, and worry), and focus using definitions adapted from previous studies (Farkas et al., 2020; Grady et al., 2019; Wege et al., 2014). Expressions were scored on a scale from 1 (mild) to 3 (very exaggerated). Interrater agreement was acceptable to excellent (% agreement = .68 for scene identification; intraclass correlation coefficient = .70 to .95 for emotion intensity).

Emotion portrayals varied by character race in frequency (see Table 1) and intensity (see Table 2). Hispanic/Latino characters portrayed happiness and curiosity at significantly higher rates and showed more intense displays of positive emotions than did characters of other races. For negative powerful emotions, Black and White characters portrayed anger and dislike at significantly higher rates and with greater intensity than did Asian and Hispanic/Latino characters. However, only White characters portrayed negative powerless emotions at significantly higher rates than characters of other races. Focus was displayed more frequently and intensely by Asian and White characters than Black and Hispanic/Latino characters.

This variability in how children’s film media portrays emotions based on character race is consistent with differences observed in children’s books that represent collectivistic and individualistic cultures (Farkas et al., 2020; Grady et al., 2019) and supports that emotion displays may also vary between collectivistic cultures (Ruby et al., 2012).

Authors

• Carmen Huang, University of the Pacific
  Presenting Author

• Melissa Cervantes, University of the Pacific
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jessica Stoltzfus Grady, University of the Pacific
  Non-Presenting Author