Research Guru / Moderator
Posted:
May 20, 2004, 3:19 PM
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Disney characters said to insult mentally ill
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Some cartoon characters found in Disney feature films encourage children to fear, shun and make fun of the mentally ill, according to a study published in this month's Canadian Journal of Psychiatry.
"Mental Illness in Disney Animated Films," by University of Calgary psychology master's student Andrea Lawson and professor Greg Fouts, states that psychology researchers at the Alberta university analyzed 34 full-length Disney animated films, including Dumbo (1941) and The Lion King (1994) to search for verbal references to mental illness.
The researchers discovered that almost all the features contained characters shown as "crazy," "mad" or "nuts," and who were, therefore, shunned and disparaged.
"Mental-illness words are used constantly and frequently within almost every single Disney film that I looked at. Overwhelmingly, in the majority of the films, those terms are used to denigrate the characters toward which those terms are directed, and to me, that's a major concern," Lawson, the study's principal investigator, told the Ottawa Citizen.
Lawson singled out Beauty and the Beast for criticism. The 1991 film refers several times to Belle and her father, Maurice, as being mentally ill. Eventually, Maurice is chained and sent off in a "lunacy wagon."
"The children watching could associate mental illness labels with people who are so frightening and dangerous that they must be chained and locked away from the rest of society," she said.
Belle and Maurice become heroes at the end of the story, "but the implication is that the only way that they become the heroes and the heroines is their sanity is vindicated, everyone finds out they're not mentally ill.
"The message is, they deserved that treatment when it was thought that they did have mental illness, and they're only vindicated because their sanity is reassured," Lawson added. "It's a fantastic message in a way -- be yourself no matter what people think of you. But there's that twist."
According to Health Canada, one in five Canadians has a mental illness sometime in their lives.
"Disney has been taken to task a number of times about their representations about race and gender and homosexuality, but never for their portrayals of mental illness. That's one of the reasons why I was interested in Disney, and also the very basic fact that Disney is the biggest producer of children's entertainment," Lawson said.
The peer-reviewed University of Calgary study said that the three evil hyenas in The Lion King are also depicted as mentally ill. The hyenas have rolling eyes and high-pitched, hysterical laughter. Ed, the "craziest" of the three, gnaws on his own leg at one point.
"It is clear the hyenas represent the lowest social group in the animal kingdom, and that they are to be feared and avoided. Thus, these 'mentally ill' characters represent an animated example of being feared, socially distanced and/or alienated," the study said.
Other Disney characters depicted as mentally ill, the study continued, included chronically depressed Grumpy and slow-witted Dopey from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), along with Mrs. Jumbo of Dumbo and Jafar of Aladdin (1992).
The study found that 85% of the Disney films reviewed contained references to mental illness in major or minor characters, compared to the 9.5% global incidence of mental illness. In British children's TV programs, references to mental illness were found in 46% of programs.
Just about the only Disney feature free of references to mental illness was Bambi (1942), Lawson said.
However, the study did acknowledge some limitations, especially that children were not interviewed by the researchers about how the Disney films may have shaped their opinions of mental illness.
"The major thing, as parents and guardians and educators, is that we really need to be critical of what our children are exposed to as far as entertainment media is concerned," Lawson concluded.
Officials from Disney could not be reached Wednesday for comment.
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"Oh boy." -- Allan Sherman
(This post was edited by eminovitz on May 24, 2004, 12:07 AM)
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Funniest Man in Gotham / Contributor
Posted:
May 23, 2004, 10:31 PM
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Re: Disney characters said to insult mentally ill
[In reply to]
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However, the study did acknowledge some limitations, especially that children were not interviewed by the researchers about how the Disney films may have shaped their opinions of mental illness.
...
"The major thing, as parents and guardians an deducators, is that we really need to be critical of what our children are exposed to as far as entertainment media is concerned," Lawson concluded.
It's amazing how contradictory these two paragraphs are. They admit that they did not research the actual reactions of children at all, and yet they go ahead and conclude from their research that vigilance in regards to children's programming is the lesson to learn here. Rarely has the scientific Socractic method been as besmirched. From what I read, the clearest and simplest conclusion of the study is that Disney films can offend people who get offended at this sort of stuff. That is all that the evidence actually proves. That they feel they can make the leap to media watchdogging by filling in their own answers on the part of the kids of the world says far more about those who made the study than the study's subject itself.
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"Excuse me, I'm sorry, I thought I just heard a line I wrote."
George S. Kaufman 115 Animated Greatest: Main Menu
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