Why superheroes are rotten role models
THEY may seem like the perfect role mod- els, fighting the bad guys and protecting the weak.
But it is not the noble deeds of superheroes such as the Hulk or Superman that many young children admire, it is their brute force.
Researchers found that youngsters who dress up as their favourite characters tended to be more aggressive but were no more likely to stick up for classmates who werebeing picked on.
The US scientists believe that nursery-age children are unable to pick up on the moral message in superhero programmes and could only comprehend the aggressive themes.
They examined the behaviour of 240 children to see how they reacted to the different characters. The youngsters were then asked to identify ten superheroes and why they liked them.
Of those who specified characteristics, 10 per cent noted some defending ability of the superheroes such as, for Spiderman, ‘because he shoots webs and he saves people’.
But 20 per cent of children associated their favourite superhero with some type of violent skill like being ‘big and can punch’ and ‘he smashes and gets angry’. Others suggested they liked the character’s blatant aggression, with answers including: ‘Because he can smash and destroy everything, and he doesn’t care because he’s a big bully’ and ‘because he can kill’.
The remaining 70 per cent had more moderate reasoning such as their ability to fly, according to the study published in the Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology.
One of the researchers, Professor Sarah Coyne, of Brigham Young University in Utah, said: ‘So many pre-schoolers are into superheroes and so many parents think that the superhero culture will help their kids defend others and be nicer to their peers. But our study shows the exact opposite. Kids pick up on the aggressive themes and not the defending ones.’