Investigating gender differences between perceptions of moral alignment in anime
Christopher R. Warren, Raquel Rubio, JJ Mueller-Dombois, Joshua Murillo, Syeda Ullah, Giovanna Pineda, Sara Dorame, & Iris Lieu
| Department of Psychology | California State Long Beach
- This research should be extended by investigating other media, having a larger data set, and looking at a more comprehensive way of measuring morality for both alignment and role.
- Future research should look into a wider range of animes and Western comics, not just those that are popular in the U.S.
- Look into the effects of potential translation errors, in which coding based on subtitles or dubbed media influence portrayals of morality.
- Characters shift throughout series, in which case a character may assume the role of an antagonist or protagonist, only to switch. Look to quantifying these switches as to determine someone’s true role, or take their final role when the series ended.
- Further study may also include investigating animated versus live action media, as to explore parallels between the mediums.
- Expanding the variables such as alignment to include categories beyond good and evil and roles that take into consideration shifts.
- Advancing, examining stress, immigration status, and how the powers of anime characters align with stereotypical gender roles.
- Beyond this, potentially looking at genre differences as they relate to gender representation.
- Group often depicted in the comic arts and media are either protagonists, antagonists, or antiheroes.
- Aim of this study was to analyze the portrayals of moral alignment present within characters of varying genders and legal status (i.e., immigrant, native) between anime and Western comics.
- Each character coded across dimensions including moral alignment (good vs. evil), moral role (protagonist, antagonist, antihero), and other character demographics (i.e., gender, legal status).
- The analysis of over 500 characters from several different animes and comic universes allowed for a wide sample base.
- Few studies traversed how gender and citizenship are represented in anime, particularly in reference to moral roles and alignment.
- Within the anime medium, there was a significant relationship between moral role and alignment, where the more evil a character was considered, the more likely they were to be deemed an antagonist.
- Furthermore, there was a significant relationship between gender and medium, where anime had a greater concentration of male characters opposed to Western comics.
- Despite this, there were no significant correlations between gender and legal status with moral alignment or moral role within the animes coded.
- Anime is a Japanese art form popularized and profited off of in the West, where the media reflects perceptions of gender expectations in alignment with societal norms shared between Western and Japanese cultures.
- In contrast, anime displays alternative gender norms, where cross-cultural differences are apparent between American comics and anime in terms of stereotypical behavior and moral role.
- Between gender identity, anime was wholly male-dominated, where female characters played either secondary roles or were omitted entirely.
- The aim of the current study was to explore the influence of gender and citizenship on portrayal of good and evil, as well as the character’s role towards the plot - protagonist, antagonist, or antihero.
- Concurrent with past literature, within the sample, 70% of anime characters identified as male, while only 30% identified as female, and none outside of the binary genders.
- This may indicate that in the male-dominated spheres of comics and reality, women are often invisible and overlooked, thus further research should investigate the origins of moral alignment discrepancies between gender identities.
- An existing database of comic book characters containing 370 characters was expanded to almost 500 characters for the purpose of this research.
- Characteristics of anime and comic characters (N=452) pertinent to this study acquired through online databases, configured onto an Excel sheet.
- Each character coded across moral alignment, moral role, and gender; coder agreement of κ = .862.
- Analyses of variance for testing of each hypothesis utilizing means across characters for each of the major variables.
- Moral alignment scale representing good=1, evil=2; moral role differentiated by 1=protagonist, 2=antagonist, 3=antihero; gender as 1=female, 2=male, 3=nonbinary.
- Pearson correlations were performed on the of 452 characters to test predictions.
- First prediction was male characters were going to dominate the narratives; analyses revealed they made up 70% of anime characters.
- Results showed that media form (i.e., anime, Western comic) was significantly correlated with gender, r(548) = .103, p = .015.
- Results showed that gender was significantly correlated with moral alignment (i.e., good, evil), r(462) = .133, p = .004, as well as moral role (i.e., protagonist, antagonist, antihero), r(458) = .132, p = .004.
- Within anime, results showed that moral alignment (i.e., good, evil) was significantly correlated with moral role (i.e., protagonist, antagonist, antihero), r(145) = .648, p < .001.
- Results demonstrated that anime seems to be more male dominated.
- No significant correlations between gender and moral alignment or moral role within the animes coded, as well as legal status.
- However, there was a significant relationship between gender and media form, where anime had a greater concentration of male characters, in comparison to Western comics.
- Beyond this, there was a significant relationship within the coded animes and between medias in reference to moral role and alignment, where when a character was coded as good, they often were protagonists, and vice versa.
- The depiction of anime and comic characters in the graphic arts supported stereotypes associated with masculinity and femininity in reference to role within the plot.
- These results can facilitate discussion about how protagonism and antagonism as they relate to good and evil influences public perception of gendered representation within comics and anime.
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