Romance cinema for debunking gender bias of non-egalitarian couple relationships in higher education

Abstract

Romance cinema may recreate cisgender heterosexual couple representations by means of image-making, with the use of gender bias or traditional images that have considerable effects on how women and men are represented or are expected to behave, which may confront egalitarian models of relationships. This study aims to analyze how the traditional model of couples is represented in the 20 romantic highest-grossing movies selected from the years 2000–2010, and whether the reading of non-egalitarian images awakens different meanings and reflections by experts and undergraduates in Higher Education (areas of education and communication). For this aim, a mixed methodology was used, first qualitative (six in-depth interviews with academics and film analyses of the selected movies), then quantitative (questionnaire to 251 undergraduates analyzing films), and then qualitative again (personal reports from the same students). Results confirmed the reflective making of gender bias and non-egalitarian images of couple relationships in six of the box-office films, with moderate percentages in categories of Submission, Dominance, Dependence, and higher percentages of Manipulation, either for/from women or men. The study concludes that romance cinema was positively valued by students and academics as an enabling cultural product for the analysis, reflection, and deconstruction of non-egalitarian images, so that higher education students can be guided to critically seek suitable understandings of gender and couple relationships.

Full text

Frontiers in Education 01 frontiersin.org
Romance cinema for debunking
gender bias of non-egalitarian
couple relationships in higher
education
BeatrizMorales-Romo
1, MaríaJ.Hernández-Serrano
2* and
NoeliaMorales-Romo
3
1 Department of Didactic, Organization and Research Methods, University of Salamanca, Salamanca,
Spain, 2 Department of Theory and History of Education, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain,
3 Department of Sociology and Communication, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain
Romance cinema may recreate cisgender heterosexual couple representations
by means of image-making, with the use of gender bias or traditional images
that have considerable eects on how women and men are represented or are
expected to behave, which may confront egalitarian models of relationships. This
study aims to analyze how the traditional model of couples is represented in the
20 romantic highest-grossing movies selected from the years 2000–2010, and
whether the reading of non-egalitarian images awakens dierent meanings and
reflections by experts and undergraduates in Higher Education (areas of education
and communication). For this aim, a mixed methodology was used, first qualitative
(six in-depth interviews with academics and film analyses of the selected
movies), then quantitative (questionnaire to 251 undergraduates analyzing films),
and then qualitative again (personal reports from the same students). Results
confirmed the reflective making of gender bias and non-egalitarian images of
couple relationships in six of the box-oce films, with moderate percentages
in categories of Submission, Dominance, Dependence, and higher percentages
of Manipulation, either for/from women or men. The study concludes that
romance cinema was positively valued by students and academics as an enabling
cultural product for the analysis, reflection, and deconstruction of non-egalitarian
images, so that higher education students can beguided to critically seek suitable
understandings of gender and couple relationships.
KEYWORDS
higher education, gender bias, couple relationships, romance cinema, critical reflection,
undergraduate students, film education
1. Introduction
Cinema is a recognized cultural medium for analyzing human life and its basic moral
attitudes (Zhang, 2017; Pippin, 2019; Saidovich etal., 2022). Besides providing meaning to a
playful and recreational act, where the challenge to “learn to learn, to learn to live” takes on all
its consistency, it prompts consideration of the value of interpersonal and intrapersonal
relationships (Padva and Buchweitz, 2017). Cinema is a powerful transmitter of values and
relationship models of all types, representing the world and oering situations that are
contextualized within specic historical and sociocultural milieus. Cinema is also a generator
of identication processes (Willis, 2017) and empathetic involvement (Gallese and Guerra,
OPEN ACCESS
EDITED BY
Carlos Dosil,
University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain
REVIEWED BY
Lucía Gloria Vázquez Rodríguez,
Complutense University of Madrid, Spain
Miguel A. Sahagun,
High Point University, UnitedStates
*CORRESPONDENCE
María J. Hernández-Serrano
mjhs@usal.es
RECEIVED 30 December 2022
ACCEPTED 20 April 2023
PUBLISHED 18 May 2023
CITATION
Morales-Romo B, Hernández-Serrano MJ and
Morales-Romo N (2023) Romance cinema for
debunking gender bias of non-egalitarian
couple relationships in higher education.
Front. Educ. 8:1134813.
doi: 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813
COPYRIGHT
© 2023 Morales-Romo, Hernández-Serrano
and Morales-Romo. This is an open-access
article distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY).
The use, distribution or reproduction in other
forums is permitted, provided the original
author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are
credited and that the original publication in this
journal is cited, in accordance with accepted
academic practice. No use, distribution or
reproduction is permitted which does not
comply with these terms.
TYPE Original Research
PUBLISHED 18 May 2023
DOI 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813

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Frontiers in Education 02 frontiersin.org
2019), making it more or less permeable in its representational
intentionality; in this sense, cinema can bea platform for experiences
“lived by others” and thus a powerful instrument for understanding
and comparing one’s own experiences (Malyshev, 2018). us, the
images represented contribute to a “practical culture” around
constructs that can be fed and reshaped by the events and
representational behaviors (good or bad) carried out by lm characters
(Munshi, 2017). Accordingly, cinema provides pivotal representations
via images that can assist citizens in recreating social interactions or
relationships. e images conveyed and evoked either by the narrative
and its points of view, or the characters, their roles, values, and
reactions, are the main instigators of audience reactions. ese
reactions may either awaken and enrich the audience’s perspectives or
reinforce traditional, limited, and non-egalitarian versions
of relationships.
e “romantic” genre is oen an ill-dened term in cinema. e
most widely accepted view refers to a lm genre that focuses on love
and romantic relationships. ere are several subgenres within this
genre: comedy, drama, and romantic thrillers. In this paper, weare
interested in romantic cinema from the rst decade of the present
century; this interest is twofold. Firstly, because despite being reviled
(Lizada, 2022) and accused of oversimplifying and making a theme
too basic, the romantic genre continues to be widely consumed
(Gammon, 2022) especially by younger audiences (Gala and
Ghadiyali, 2020). In fact, its consumption increased during the
pandemic (Tello Díaz, 2021), suggesting that we seek out certain
movies, depending on our individual or contextual needs. Rutledge
(2018) and Capers (2022) have argued that romantic movie scenarios
can behealthy, relaxing, and therapeutic, disputing the negative claims
about watching romantic lms. Secondly, because regardless of
consumer needs, this study focuses on the images of relationships
revealed in romance cinema. In modern societies, the advancement
toward egalitarian relationships among couples must represent
diversity in sexuality, multiculturalism, or intimacy. However, these
images are not as common as expected in such lms, especially
considering that they are commonly consumed by young audiences
in the genre of romance and its subgenre of romantic comedies (rom-
coms). In such cases, images of relationships use gender bias, cisgender
relationships, and traditional images, which can shape how women
and men are represented and how they are expected to behave. In the
absence of egalitarian representations, such biased portrayals must
be considered critically, enabling students to develop a better
understanding of couple relationships. erefore, in this study,
weconsider that, although the romance genre has long been regarded
as inferior by critics and scholars alike, it has a powerful reach due to
its high rate of consumption. is makes it a signicant image-maker
of couples that can beused to foster reection and open discussion in
the context of higher education.
Images in lms are not necessarily causal or conscious, but rather
subjective, and rely upon the audience’s media-reception skills. e
aforementioned skills include decoding, critical reection,
intercommunication, and identication with the characters (Igartua
etal., 2009). In this paper, which is particularly concerned with the
use of cinema in education, the educommunication model (Aguaded
and Delgado-Ponce, 2019) serves as an approach for framing images
from the perspective of civic participation and critical reection. is
involves questioning the information available and the possible
non-neutrality of the media, social media, and any information
transmitter within connectivity culture (Van Dijck, 2016). is model
provides instruments for understanding, situating, and debunking the
social production of media and transmedia in plural and multicultural
societies. From the values of democratic dialogue, the media prosumer
can assume a critical distance, becoming a conscious consumer
capable of reecting on herself, relationships, and how reality is
portrayed by the media. Coe and Yeung (2019) found that cultural
creations and educational systems in general are commodities,
although they cloak the underlying economic networks. In this paper,
the approach of educommunication inspires us to sensitize ourselves
to the images transmitted and omitted in widely consumed movies.
Cinema establishes points of reference for societies, epochs, and
theories by providing material that would bedicult to recreate from
other non-audiovisual parameters alone. It broadens systems of
reference, sociological canons, and cultural or ethical models. e
relevance of cinema as a powerful instrument for transmitting
meaning is evident (Chaparro, 2014; Klinger, 2021). is is precisely
the foundation on which this study is based: to use the potentialities
of cinema to turn students into reective image-makers who are aware
of powerful inuences and can discern which images are under-or
misrepresented. According to Morín (2008), cinema provides students
with three kinds of potential: (1) to elicit and generate reective
dialogues on various topics, aiding in their understanding; (2) to
present ways of seeing, broadening understanding, and experiencing
the world in particular spaces and contexts not conceived of; and (3)
to oer them the opportunity to confront the images seen with their
own experiences and to construct, reshape, or consolidate the sense
and meaning of their lives.
According to Van Belle (2022), mediatization deals with long-
term cultural transformations in and through the media. However, the
eect of media, such as cinema, is not equitable among its viewers.
Numerous variables, such as age, gender, or cultural capital, can
determine the level of inuence, and it is possible to pinpoint specic
media events that have caused more radical changes than others. In
this study, wefocus on university students with educational proles
that are more closely linked to critical reections on the consumption
of lm products.
2. Deconstructing non-egalitarian/
biased couple relationship images in
romance cinema
Societies are still inuenced by myths and biases regarding the
roles of women. In particular, myths about relationships are based on
a traditional model of relationships that continues to have negative
eects on the vision and experiences of women. Cinema, as a cultural
product, can beconsumed from a position of passivity, perpetuating
such gender biases, or from a reective and critical position, which is
the one that guides this research. Specically, in romance cinema, the
role of women is seen and experienced with consequent repercussions
if certain non-egalitarian values are assumed to benormal or idealized,
which feeds on these stereotypes. A misreading or normalization of
such portrayals can becounterproductive, which is why critical media
education is needed to enable audiences to understand how to process
and avoid normalizing these images and biases.
Some studies have focused on cinema as an enabler of reection
and critical dialogue in education. Decoster and Vansieleghem (2014)

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Frontiers in Education 03 frontiersin.org
have shown various ways of understanding the cinema/education
binomial, analyzing cinematographic pedagogy and reecting on the
pedagogical discussion among Giroux (2004), Benjamin (2008), and
Deleuze (2013), highlighting the need for reection to understand the
implications of cinema for thought and education. More importantly,
however, students can reect on cinema, but they cannot befully
aware of the extent of its moral and ethical impact (Barral etal., 2018).
Gozálvez and Contreras emphasized the importance of attention and
commitment training to mold “citizens capable of understanding the
ebb and ow of reasoning that constitutes the substance of the
democratic process” (Gozálvez and Contreras, 2014, p.135). Aguaded
(2013) stressed the need to adapt to the constant changes in global
communication, where cinema has the power to represent changes
and milestones. Recently, Ferrada (2020) studied the coexistence of
the three meanings of dialogic pedagogy between Socrates, Freire, and
Bakhtin by pointing out the critical act of knowing and reading reality,
based on discovery; learning to elicit reections; and developing a
critical consciousness that can lead to transformation.
According to previous research (Gómez, 2004; Capdevila etal.,
2011; De Sanmamed, 2012), the established alternative and traditional
models help us understand the meanings constructed about a cultural
manifestation for analyzing lms. e traditional model, based on
gender stereotypes, is inequitable and sexist, and includes a series of
variables carrying a negative connotation. In contrast, the alternative
model is based on a relationship of equality between the members of
the couple, with friendship, respect, and consideration for both.
Various types of readings come to light in romance lms, and it
can be determined to what kind of representations each type of
reading is referring. Traditional models are associated with
non-egalitarian images, such as submission, dependence,
manipulation, domination, abuse, or violence. Conversely, alternative
models highlight equality and shared values, such as friendship,
independence, sharing, respect, or dialogue, which are the most
relevant images for this study. When applied to lms, to identify
whether the relationships portrayed belong to one model or the other,
weinclude the analysis of images associated with women, men, or
both, via types of interconnection, such as domination and
submission, which are shown as the two sides of the same equation,
in which men mainly exercise dominance over submissive women.
Dependence appears associated with women with respect to men but
women can manipulate men too (Estrada, 2010; Mendoza, 2018). It
should benoted that it is equally biased to associate women with
submission as with domination, as reported by Luce Irigaray, who
criticizes the idea of egalitarian gender aspirations as desirable
(Bovone, 2022). us, the focus must beplaced on the bias and
expectations that forced such representations, instead of widening
gender and couple identications or behavioral expectations. In this
regard, based on the ve categories that make up the traditional
model (submission, domination, manipulation, dependence, and
violence), the literature on couple relationships has associated some
of these categories with men and others with women (Herrera, 2016;
Kabeer, 2016; Ozaki and Otis, 2017; Willis and Nelson-Gray, 2017;
Arriaga etal., 2018). Meanwhile, more specic studies on couple
relationships between young adults and teenagers include these
specic categories (Mogollón and Villamizar, 2015; Núñez et al.,
2015; Flores and Browne, 2017; Breitenstein etal., 2018). e closed
and traditional associations between categories and gender are shown
in Figure1.
As spectators, weare witnessing how recent romance lms may
beused to promote egalitarian relations between the sexes, free from
traditional patriarchal roles and accompanying stereotypes that, until
only a few years ago, seemed inevitable, or the emergence of the
“smart” subgenre of “chick icks” (Radner, 2017). In addition, the
more recent entries in the romance genre may depict the realities and
complexities of intimacy and modern gender roles (San Filippo, 2021).
Conversely, romance lms from 2000 to 2010, which are still
frequently consumed (Illouz, 2018), even by younger generations
(Ariza etal., 2014; Soto-Sanel etal., 2019), oen perpetuate biases
and normalized images of relationships between men and women.
is is the area chosen by the authors of this study to identify images
of traditional and egalitarian relationships among the couples
represented, in which it was necessary to analyze whether awareness
and reection arose in viewers.
e aim of this study is to analyze how this traditional model is
represented in romance cinema and whether non-egalitarian images
provoke dierent readings and reections in academics in higher
education and younger spectators (undergraduate students) in the
areas of media communication and education. Both groups are
supposedly literate or predisposed to detect non-egalitarian values,
and the study aims to nd out how they process the images of women,
men, and relationships in romantic cinema and understand whether
they are aware of the biases. While reective and critical readings of
cinema are possible, this is not always the case (De la Pava Vélez,
2021). e objective is to understand the perceived level of reection
and recognition and ultimately to determine if it is possible to propose
the use of this type of cinema as an educational tool to demystify
certain non-egalitarian values that are easier to recognize.
e hypotheses supported in this study are that experts and
trained students will recognize non-egalitarian images associated with
gender bias in romance lms (Hypothesis 1, H1), in which associations
between men and women are opposed to the egalitarian images
expected in advanced or plural societies (H2).
For these hypotheses, and exploring box-oce romance cinema
as an enabler of image-maker reection, two research questions were
dened: RQ1 (H1): To what extent do non-egalitarian images of
couple relationships appear to drive reection in romance lms?
According to traditional and egalitarian models, wealso proposed
RQ2 (H2): What are the associations with images of women, men, or
both in romance cinema during the rst decade of the 21st century?
3. Materials and methods
Mixed methods have been used to merge and reconcile data for
an integrated interpretation of image-making processes (Creswell and
Clark, 2017). In this study, aer consulting several indexes, wedecided
to follow the international index of the World Wide Box Oce in
accordance with the context of the lms. e selection was based on
the highest-grossing movies, mostly produced in the US, which were
framed as “Global Hollywood,” and with considerable worldwide
consumption. As Molina (2006) argued, Global Hollywood is a
capitalist institution consistent with the concepts of cultural
commodication and identity formation in the transnational
worldview. Moreover, Global Hollywood embodies the
internationalization of nancing, production, and distribution
(Goldsmith etal., 2012), framing the international impact of American

Morales-Romo et al. 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813
Frontiers in Education 04 frontiersin.org
cinema. e lms selected for the study were the top20 movies
released between 2000 and 2010: Sex in the City I; What Women Want;
My Big Fat Greek Wedding; Hitch; Meet the Parents; e Devil Wears
Prada; Sex in the City II; American Pie 2; Valentine’s Day; e Ugly
Truth; 50 First Dates; He’s Just Not at into You; How to Lose a Guy in
10 Days; Couples’ Retreat; Chocolat; Save the Last Dance; e Notebook;
Dear John; Life as WeKnow It; and Letters to Juliet.
Firstly, the researchers conducted a qualitative analysis by
examining the selected movies and verifying whether each of the
variables associated with traditional and alternative models could
beobserved in the lm through inter-reliability correspondences.
Considering the categories depicted in Figure 1, we analyzed,
identied, and labeled possible biases for men and women, as well as
the links established between them, as a result of the deconstruction
process of the 20 selected romance lms. is analysis revealed that
non-egalitarian images were present in 18 of the movies, with higher
percentages found for both men and women in images depicting the
following: dependence, usually emotional and mainly for women (18
of the movies), manipulation/deceit (13 of the movies), and
submission/dominance, overlapping among women and men (10 of
them). It is worth noting that 15 of the movies presented more than
one couple among the relationships and that, for this analysis, images
of all of them were considered.
Secondly, weutilized two types of sources for the study, experts
and students of higher education, both in the areas of education and
communication. Two dierent focuses were identied for the analysis,
according to Beaudouin and Pasquier (2016): lm-centered (romance
cinema genre) and reception-centered (students’ subjective perception
of images in each movie).
Six personal, in-depth interviews were conducted with selected
professionals in Castile and Leon, Spain, in the elds of education and
communication, as well as with experts in gender and equality. e
topics of the interviews were focused on (1) attitudes toward romance
cinema, (2) images of men and women shown and their contrast with
social reality, (3) the inuence of the images represented in cinema on
spectators, and (4) the use of cinema for educommunicational
purposes. e sources included the following professional proles: I1
[Interview 1]: Mrs. Senior Lecturer in audio-visual communication at a
Spanish university, woman, aged 50–55 years old; I2: Mr. Senior Lecturer
in the area of languages and literature at a Spanish university, man, aged
40–45; I3: Mrs. Professor of the master’s program in interdisciplinary
gender studies, woman, aged 55–60; I4: Mr. Associate Professor in the
area of communication at a Spanish university, man, aged 45–50; I5:
Mrs. Graduate in education sciences and PhD candidate in
interdisciplinary gender studies, woman, aged 25–30; I6: Mr. Professor
in the master’s program in interdisciplinary gender studies, man,
aged 35–40.
Finally, quantitative (using a questionnaire) data were obtained
from a sample of 251 higher education students specializing in
education (195 teacher training and pedagogy students) and
communication (56 advertising and public relations students) from
the University of Salamanca, Spain.
Non-probabilistic purposive or judgmental sampling was used.
Several criteria were used to select the sample. Firstly, the university
degrees of the University of Salamanca linked to the object of study
were selected. Secondly, the questionnaire was given to students in the
last year of each chosen degree program to ensure greater academic
knowledge of the analyzed variables and to give them a broader view
of aspects such as the use of cinema in the classroom (which, although
not part of this article, is included in the broader research from which
the data originate).
Owing to the fact that the sample was made up of those with highly
feminized degrees, there was a predominance of women (199) with
respect to men (52). is gender imbalance was taken into account in
the data analysis in which contingency tables were made and the
chi-square test was applied to determine whether there were signicant
dierences in the data obtained between men and women. e
dierences were only signicant in 3 of the 25 items analyzed in total.
An ad hoc questionnaire was designed and validated by six
experts, specically intended to measure students’ perceptions of
couple images in romantic lms. e initial instrument included items
that did not withstand the rigor of the four experts who validated it.
As a result, the questionnaire was structured into three parts:
sociodemographic information (gender, age, and course); attitudes/
perceptions toward romance cinema (Likert-type items); and
analytical information for romance cinema (semantic dierential to
determine the presence of categories that make up the non-egalitarian
image–manipulation, violence, dependency, submission, and
dominance–or the presence of non-egalitarian images in the sample
lms of the study).
Finally, the same sample of higher education students was asked
three open-ended questions in the form of an individual report. ese
questions were related to (1) their attitudes toward romance cinema,
(2) the perception of images of non-egalitarian relationships, and (3)
proposals for educommunication. e integration of these individual
value judgments was used to congure a stage of connection with
expert perceptions, focusing on the object of the study, that of image-
maker reection.
FIGURE1
Traditional model and categories associated with men and women.

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Frontiers in Education 05 frontiersin.org
Quantitative data were analyzed using IBM SPSS. Each item was
measured with consideration given to the frequency per gender, and
the data were analyzed for each variable for men and women to
compare the average scores. Standard deviations and Pearson
chi-squares were applied to obtain dierences between men and
women and the dispersion of their attitudes; this analytical process
served for RQ1. e qualitative data were analyzed according to
categories describing non-egalitarian images to gain insight into
students’ attitudes toward romance cinema. e emerging categories
from the expert interviews and student reports were added for a
second analysis; this analytical process served for RQ2.
4. Results
e results of the study were organized according to the two main
research questions collating higher education students’ [Q1:
questionnaire 1] and experts’ outcomes [I1: interview 1]: rstly, on the
female, male, and couple relationship images perceived in romance
lms in general (RQ1). Secondly, according to the four variables for
the analysis of non-egalitarian images, the identication of the images
associated with men and women was interlaced with the subjective
reception-centered analysis of the 20 selected romance lms by
students (RQ2).
4.1. Perceptions toward romance cinema
images of women, men, and couples (RQ1)
According to Table1, their attitudes toward the reective potential
of images represented in romantic cinema were located in the medium
critical values as they did not give forceful answers (never, always).
Images of women and men were reported to beseen as traditional or
non-egalitarian “sometimes,” with no signicant dierences by gender.
In this case, both male and female students reported that biased
images were occasionally observed, being more acutely perceived as
such by women. However, the coupled images were viewed more
critically by the men in the sample. Statistically signicant dierences
by gender were only found in the perception of biased social reality
(Xi = 21.06, p value = 0.000), with the majority of women being less
critical. is was also reected in their open-ended answers:
In my opinion, many of the relationships that appear in romantic
cinema present an image that has much to do with reality. [Q144]
I think that cinema continues to show social reality: women
look for their prince charming and console themselves by
watching romantic movies; however, society begins to move
forward, and the liberalization of women becomes increasingly
evident, so I think that it should be more faithfully
represented. [Q98]
While students consume romance cinema for entertainment,
according to Table1, the majority of them debunked non-egalitarian
images as they were aware that such movies present unrealistic images,
thus showing the capability for arousing reection. In fact, as other
studies have shown, their responses reect this aspect of “relax and do
not think” while watching a movie (Deleuze, 2013) in which the
images presented are already assumed to be unrealistic, or to
be something that should not be normalized, as conrmed by
their reports:
Cinema tries to manipulate us in the way wetreat our partner,
friends, and family with dierentiation between men and
women. [Q42]
In my opinion, romantic cinema greatly distorts the reality of
couples’ relationships. I believe that they have commercial
motives. [Q160]
Academic experts contend that cinema is a transmitter of biased
images that must beanalyzed for reection, using examples such as
the detection of sexist behavior to foster more egalitarian relationships:
Romantic cinema falsies reality but, at the same time, addresses
society’s “true” fantasies. [I2]
Obviously, yes (in relation to romantic cinema showing a biased
reality) because the concept of love is typical of the rich
West. [I4]
TABLE1 Undergraduates’ perceptions toward images represented in romance cinema.
Romance
Cinema
reproduces
Gender Never Sometimes Often Always Average SD
Biased social images of
reality
M ,0% 46,0% 38,0% 16,0% 2,4,378 ,59,326
W 1,0% 61,9% 35,5% 1,5%
Woman’s traditional
images
M 2,0% 50,0% 38,0% 10,0% 2,4,821 ,67,726
W 4,0% 51,3% 38,7% 6,0%
Man’s traditional
images
M 4,0% 56,0% 34,0% 6,0% 2,3,280 ,66,798
W 8,1% 57,1% 31,3% 3,5%
Traditional couple
relationships images
M ,0% 44,0% 50,0% 6,0% 2,5,320 ,67,736
W 5,1% 45,5% 42,9% 6,6%
Source: the authors.

Morales-Romo et al. 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813
Frontiers in Education 06 frontiersin.org
Romantic cinema is, by denition, conservative and wants to meet
the public’s expectations. is does not mean that it does not
change; it evolves according to cultural context. For example, the
American romantic comedy of the 1940s was much more liberal
than that of the 1980s or the 1990s. [I2]
For the experts, a certain veiled rejection of this genre of cinema
was observed based on commonplace tropes and stereotypes. If
romance cinema was used for educational purposes, they would
consider critical analysis fundamental. e idea of fostering critical
thinking was also a constant theme in all interviews as a key element
for working with cinema in the classroom. e following verbatim
quote in response to the question of how cinema could beused in the
classroom to reduce gender inequality included the following ideas:
From my point of view, in two directions: one, go for lms that
break with the traditional canons, with empowered and
autonomous female characters, and, this is important, with male
characters that subvert traditional roles. Second, using more
“conventional” lms and analyzing them from a critical
perspective is usually a good starting point for educational
programs. [I4]
Experts also extended some of their statements to support the
educational potential of eliciting critical awareness in all cinema
genres, as well as in other forms of cultural production.
In my view, not only cinema, but all media, can serve to socialize
students in the classroom because they show the light and
shadows of the reality that is taken up by the director of that lm:
they serve to denounce, they serve to motivate; the same for
equality: when wecriticize gender violence, invasions, clitoral
ablation, as for inequality, cinema must beused as an educational
instrument. Youreally do have a weapon here; those of youwho
work on these things, it’s tremendous … [I3].
4.2. Images of non-egalitarian couple
relationships associated with men and
women (RQ2)
Following their viewing of romance lms, students were asked
about the presence of the categories that make up the traditional
model: submission, dependency, manipulation, dominance, and
violence. ey were asked to dierentiate within the category whether
it could bematched to men or women. e outcomes were not as
polarized as expected, and some of the associations between images
of men and women established in the theoretical framework (Figure1)
were questioned, while others were conrmed, as shown in Table2.
For the students, the romantic genre showed a slightly more
dominant man and a slightly more submissive woman, not clearly at
the extreme poles, although contrary perceptions were found in their
reports, identifying an evolution, as in the last item.
ey are usually very traditional lms where they place the
stereotypes of dominant and submissive women on the
man. [Q16]
Today, the image of a woman is more dominant, and a man suers
for her love. [Q232]
At rst, women were seen as more submissive, and they had been
outdone. ey are no longer inferior to men. ey also
decide. [Q117]
Manipulation was perceived as mutual and balanced between the
traditional categories, conrming the presence of manipulative
relationships. e same applied to dependence, since the students
perceived a greater dependence on men among women. However, in
several excerpts, they indicated an evolution toward greater
interdependence between genders in those lms:
Above all, I observe that women are highly dependent on
men. [Q135]
Dependence of women on men is appreciated in traditional or
older lms, but in more modern lms it is not appreciated as
much. [Q28]
e violence category appeared stable, without being associated
with a predominant gender. is could be due to a lack of
dierentiation symptoms, as discussed in the literature as the
camouage of fun times (O’Connor, 2008) or masculinity (Buchbinder,
2008). In fact, violence was mentioned only once in open reports
referring to both genders:
As in life itself, one can see how violence can exist from men to
women, and as manipulation by both men and women. [Q144]
TABLE2 Non-egalitarian images represented in romance films.
Submissive
woman
1 2 3 4 5 Dominant
woman
Submissive man 1 2 3 4 5 Dominant man
Manipulative
women
1 2 3 4 5 Manipulated
woman
Manipulative
man
1 2 3 4 5 Manipulated
man
Wom an
dependent on a
man
1 2 3 4 5 Wom an
independent of
man
Man dependent
on a woman
1 2 3 4 5 Man
independent of
woman
Woman attracted
to Violence
1 2 3 4 5 Woman rejecting
Violence
Man attracted to
Violence
1 2 3 4 5 Man rejecting
Violence
Traditionalisms
toward the
relationship
1 2 3 4 5 Progressive
equity toward
the relationship
Source: the authors.

Morales-Romo et al. 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813
Frontiers in Education 07 frontiersin.org
Finally, the undergraduates reported that images of romantic
relationships were closer to more progressive ideals than traditional
frames, without being totally progressive.
Perhaps romantic lms tend to bemore progressive but cling to
the image of platonic love. [Q106]
In general, the traditional approach has been to create romantic
comedies, but lately, the roles change from time to time or are
equalized. [Q53]
In traditional romantic movies, men rule over women; however,
they are currently releasing new lms in which the situation is
equal for men and women. [Q81]
e image of an independent and leading woman is becoming
more frequent. [Q107]
Recent studies have supported this idea of evolution, since
conventions and myths are oen opposite to those in recent lms,
with appreciable improvements in female roles or diversity (Radner,
2017). Data from the students’ reports indicated that they perceived
this shi toward more egalitarian images:
In my opinion, in couple relationships, the stereotypes of a
dominant man and manipulative woman remain, although this is
changing little by little. [Q38]
In recent years, the relationships shown in romantic cinema have
become more balanced between the two genders than they were
years ago. [Q145]
All these data were taken from students’ reports of general
perceptions toward romance cinema; the following table (Table3)
shows their analysis of the 20 selected lms. It should betaken into
account that not all of the students knew of or had seen the same
movies. e table shows those perceptions equal to or higher than
20%. us, 18 of the lms in the sample are reected in this table, as
Letters to Juliet and Chocolat showed high percentages of perception
of equality: 77 and 49%, respectively. Regardless of the fact that some
lm’s plots correspond to several couples, the students indicated the
perceived representation of non-egalitarian images in any of the
relationships in each movie.
Since violence was perceived in less than 20% of the lms, it is not
included in Table 3. For the other four categories, the outcomes
revealed more specically that submission and dependence, although
perceived by students in several lms, were both present in less than
40% of lms, making submission the least perceived category in the
analyzed lms.
With regard to manipulation, this was perceived as exercised by
women on men (with percentages higher than 50%) and by men on
women (with the highest percentage of 84% in Hitch), which is new
for the traditional model. is was the category most frequently
perceived by the students in these lms.
Dominance also appears in both directions: by men on women
and by women on men. In addition, it appears at a high rate of
52% in the movie Sex in the City I, but it does so in the opposite
direction to the traditional model: it is women who exercise
dominance over men. In the study of Lorié’s (2015), which is an
analysis of the series on which this film is based, it is already
indicated that an evolution of gender roles has occurred, although
this would require the use of an educational aid for framing such
images. This is because viewers are unable to decipher the manner,
intent, and emphasis in the transmission; thus, such ideological
messaging may become self-cancelling. Dominance is a traditional
non-egalitarian image, so this kind of evolution in association
with women must be effectively framed and requires
critical decoding.
In the last research phase, the students lled out open-ended
reports, and it was found that the undergraduates identied a
continuum in the traditional associations between the categories and
gender, as shown in other studies (Mogollón and Villamizar, 2015;
Flores and Browne, 2017):
In men, it is as if it gave him superior power and the most
submissive woman, but not in all cases is it so; it must besaid that
not all lms are the same. [Q79]
Traditional images continue to show that women are at the mercy
of men and what they want to do. [Q133]
Cinema continues to support and promote the typied social roles
of both men and women. e woman is weak and emotional,
while the man is a protector and good to capture. [Q69]
In addition, a consensus between the students and experts was
found when considering that romantic cinema is directed toward a
certain audience, evidencing that it is aimed at women:
Most romantic cinema focuses on female audiences, and Isuppose
that the Prince Charming fantasy is part of many women’s
subconscious. Popular cinema oers solutions, and a great
solution for loneliness is to fantasize about the ideal couple and,
in addition, perfect, that simple. [I2]
Women prefer the romantic genre because they are characterized
by being more sentimental than men. [Q109]
is perception was reinforced by the fact that the students
showed a great dierence in their consumption of the 20 lms that
made up the sample. e women had seen an average of 10 lms,
while the men had watched only four. is seems to show that this
type of lmography is consumed more by women than by men. Even
though the experts were more critical, they did not nd this to bea
drawback for their use of such lms in class. Instead, they highlighted
their potential to stimulate critical reection.
I always try to use cinema, not your typical commercial cinema,
and when weuse it, it is to make a critical analysis of it. ere is

Morales-Romo et al. 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813
Frontiers in Education 08 frontiersin.org
another type of cinema that transmits certain types of issues that
do serve, at least to make people think. [I1]
Yes, it would bea didactic-educational means for, in this case,
detecting and analyzing sexist behavior. us, it contributes to
education in healthy and free relationships, both in friendships
and in couple relationships. [I5]
Figure 2 visually represents the results of this image-making
process of the romance lms by the students, where some categories
of the traditional model (compared to Figure1: black letters for men;
white letters for women) are removed because of their
underrepresentation, such as violence. Other categories, such as
dominance or submission, are less represented (sunken categories)–
while others, such as manipulation, are highly perceived (embossed
categories). In addition, new categories are added to the other
expected gender, multiplying the non-egalitarian images for men and
women by generating a new interconnection between the submissive
man and the manipulative woman.
e H1 supported in this study was conrmed, because the
experts and trained students recognized the non-egalitarian images
associated with the traditional model of relationships. However, they
also found new categories associated with men and women from the
egalitarian model, such as independence. is nding could establish
new pathways in the area of lm education, magnifying gender bias
and broadening reection. Eventually, for traditional or new gender
bias, romance lms can be considered useful image-makers for
debunking gender relationship bias between men and women, with
the potential to prompt critical reection on such images and values
in advanced or plural societies.
5. Discussion
We began by establishing that higher education students can
bebetter guided to become reective image-makers of non-egalitarian
images represented in the romance cinema of the rst decade of the
21st century. e results conrmed that the model and images of
successful couple relationships represent non-egalitarian values,
conrming the H2. is is relevant because the transmissivity eect
of such images, although subjectively perceived, can inuence younger
generations’ cultural practices regarding how couple relationships can
work. Such representations and conventions require critical judges
and educational guidance to elicit Nussbaum’s (2010) idea of narrative
imagination or an intelligent image-maker. us, the results of this
study suggest that the use of cinema for educational purposes,
specically romance cinema, requires instruction and progressive
TABLE3 Percentages of non-egalitarian images perceived in the selected romantic films.
Movie Manipulation Domination Submission Dependence
M to W W to M M to W W to M M to W W to M M to W W to M
Hitch 84 31 20 25 33 23
Sex in the City II 63 36 27
Sex in the City I 51 52 21 33
How to Lose a
Guy in 10 Days
22 54 28 20 -
What Women
Wan t
59 32 25 21 24
American Pie II 49 32 25 20 38 20
He’s Just not that
into You
35 23 23 36
e devil wears
Prada
41 41 24
e ugly truth 40 33 21
My Big Fat Greek
Wedding
20 20 22
50 rst dates 28 38
e notebook 35 27
Life as wenow it 26 26 35
Meet the parents 31 21 24 31
Valentin’s Day 31 24 26 26
Couples’s retreat 29 24 29 24
Save the last
dance
25 27 27
Life as weknow 22
Source: the authors.

Morales-Romo et al. 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813
Frontiers in Education 09 frontiersin.org
acquisition of skills, mainly training in reection, comprehension, and
critical judgement (Alonso, 2017; Haywood et al., 2019). Learning
how to consciously reect on and decipher the images of couples in
romance cinema is paramount because images are not only
transmitters but also forces in the reproduction of traditional models
of relationships, far from being removed from their evolution
or transgression.
e interpretation of couple relationships is inherent to the
spectator and what they seek to understand as a subjective process of
image-making, with broad frames for interpretation. In addition,
images are framed to aect viewers and are not always intended to
provoke critical reactions. us, if they are framed appropriately with
educational guidance, an image will not only have the power to aect
viewers, but also the ability to critically change the normalization of
conventions, bias, or the omission of images against egalitarian values.
Exposure to the misrepresentation of couple relationship images, and
even the normalization of dependence, abuse, or domination between
men and women, as this study has reported, requires more attention.
A re-evaluation of how images of couple relationships are made for
the eective reection and critical dialogue of active spectators is also
needed. is is particularly important for younger generations
(Morales-Romo and Morales-Romo, 2020), who are oen the
expected audience in this genre (the rom-com subgenre) and are most
in need of educational clues and strategies for reecting on image-
making. e focus on critical reection and the value of image-makers
requires training spaces, within the context of higher education and
even before that point, that provide learners with the tools to debunk
partially or wholly wrong images shaped by changing contexts,
interpretations, unstitching, or remixing.
e outcomes of this study also revealed variability in image
making, with dierences in the identication of the traditional model
categories toward men and women in the analyzed lms. is can
beconsidered a symptom of democratization and diversity in critical
thinking (Herman and Kraehe, 2018). Even if image-making
reections were not polarized or uniform, perhaps due to the highly
variable nature of the romantic cinema genre, several images of the
traditional model of couple relationships were found. At the same
time, certain levels of progress toward egalitarian relationships were
evidenced in relation to the independence of women, and there was
not a high level of representation of the submission or dominance
categories in these lms, even though little violence was perceived.
However, the perception of manipulation by both men and women
was the highest category accounted for in the romance lms. is
should not bemisinterpreted as an indicator of evolution simply
because traditionally powerful roles are associated with women
rather than men, as in the case of the dominance of women over men.
One of the main implications of the outcomes of this study is that
it warns of how the traditional categories are multiplied and extended
to both men and women, and represented in past box-oce romance
cinema, which is still being widely consumed by younger generations.
e study’s participants, including experts and students, suggested
that fresh entries in the romance cinema genre could represent
progressively more egalitarian images. It will beinteresting in the
future to compare our data from past decades’ lms with analyses of
new romance lms since studies have not yet analyzed such dierences
or rmly concluded that there is evidence of a contrast between such
categories in recent lms. Further analysis is needed regarding the
expectancy of higher levels of diversity of gender images in current
romance lms, with new studies analyzing egalitarian model
categories of respect, friendship, and mutual consideration. Research
is also needed on wider levels of reections on couple images,
considering that most of the couples represented in the lms from
2000 to 2010 were white heterosexual couples, as claimed in other
studies (Sadeghi, 2019). Analysis of various audience cohorts would
also benecessary, contrasting several reecting and image-making
processes among people of various ages and the impact on the
evolution of media reception skills.
Finally, there was also evidence of a critical attitude toward this
genre of romance cinema, considered inferior by experts for captivating
less-skilled audiences. Even considering that romance cinema does not
simply address a pre-existing audience, it has the power to constitute a
type of audience ready for the consistency of that image, which could
beproblematic. Despite being consumed primarily for entertainment
and not deep thinking (Deleuze, 2013), the reading and debunking of
non-egalitarian images by students indicated a degree of reection. In
line with this, cinema was positively valued by higher education
FIGURE2
Non-egalitarian couple relationships images associated with men and women in romance cinema.

Morales-Romo et al. 10.3389/feduc.2023.1134813
Frontiers in Education 10 frontiersin.org
students and experts as an enabling cultural product for the analysis,
reection, and deconstruction of images, which may involve a
confrontation with the values of egalitarian and plural societies.
erefore, it is a powerful tool in the eld of educommunication. While
the participants expected to bereectors, given their aliation with the
communication and education areas, fostering reection and debate
must become part of civic education in the analysis of cultural media
and transmedia at the global level. Audiences are capable of engaging
in reection; however, this is not an automatic process and it must
beinformed by guiding citizens to critically attend to certain biases and
forceful representations while avoiding the normalization of biased
images and representations of gender roles and couples.
Data availability statement
e raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will
bemade available by the authors, without undue reservation.
Ethics statement
Ethical review and approval was not required for the study on
human participants in accordance with the local legislation and
institutional requirements. e patients/participants provided their
written informed consent to participate in this study.
Author contributions
NM-R and BM-R contributed to the conception and design of the
study and performed the statistical analysis. BM-R organized the
database. NM-R and MH-S wrote the rst dra of the manuscript and
depicted the gures. All authors contributed to the article and
approved the submitted version.
Funding
is original research is framed under an International Research
Project in the area of information literacy skills of educators: “MIC-
MAC. Using micro-learning to train educators− a cascade approach
to media and information literacy” (2021–2023). is work was
funded by Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and European Media and
Information Fund, Ref. 268745. Previous work was based on a
research stage on digital competences from the Erasmus+Project:
FLEXICOMP. Digital Competences for adaptive, exible, and inclusive
vocational education and training, European Commission, Ref.
2020-1-UK01-KA226-VET-094538.
Conflict of interest
e authors declare that the research was conducted in the
absence of any commercial or nancial relationships that could
beconstrued as a potential conict of interest.
Publisher’s note
All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors
and do not necessarily represent those of their aliated
organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the
reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or
claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or
endorsed by the publisher.
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