Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, AB, Canada.
Department of Psychology, University of Bath, Bath, United Kingdom.
Pain. 2021 Mar 1;162(3):967-975. doi: 10.1097/j.pain.0000000000002086.
Pain (eg, needle injections, injuries, and chronic pain) is highly prevalent in childhood and occurs in social contexts. Nevertheless, broader sociocultural influences on pediatric pain, such as popular media, have not been empirically examined. This study examined how pain is portrayed and gendered in children's popular media. A cross-section of children's media targeted towards 4- to 6-year-old children was selected based on popularity, including 10 movies and the first season of 6 television shows. Pain instances were extracted and coded using 2 established observational coding systems assessing sufferer pain characteristics and observer responses (eg, empathic responses). Findings identified 454 instances of pain across the selected media. Violent pain (ie, intentionally inflicted) and injuries were most commonly represented, whereas everyday, chronic-type, and procedural pains were infrequently portrayed. Pain instances were more commonly experienced by boy characters, who also expressed greater distress; yet, observers were more responsive (eg, expressed greater concern) towards girl characters' pain. Overall, observer responses to pain were infrequent, with observers witnessing but not responding to nearly half of pain instances. Observers who did respond expressed an overall lack of empathy towards sufferers. These findings reveal a very narrow depiction of pain presented in children's popular media, with an overall underrepresentation of pain, numerous maladaptive portrayals of pain, and gender differences in both sufferer and observer responses. This study underscores the need for further research to inform how children's popular media is perceived by parents and children and how media may be transformed and harnessed for effective pain education in childhood.
疼痛（例如，针注射、损伤和慢性疼痛）在儿童中非常普遍，并发生在社会环境中。然而，流行媒体等更广泛的社会文化因素对儿科疼痛的影响尚未得到实证研究。本研究考察了儿童流行媒体中疼痛是如何被描绘和性别化的。根据流行度，选择了针对 4 至 6 岁儿童的儿童媒体的横断面，包括 10 部电影和 6 部电视剧的第一季。使用 2 种成熟的观察性编码系统提取和编码疼痛实例，评估了患者疼痛特征和观察者反应（例如，共情反应）。研究结果在选定的媒体中发现了 454 例疼痛实例。暴力疼痛（即故意造成的）和损伤最为常见，而日常、慢性和程序性疼痛则很少出现。疼痛实例更常见于男孩角色，他们也表现出更大的痛苦；然而，观察者对女孩角色的疼痛反应更为强烈（例如，表达了更大的关注）。总体而言，观察者对疼痛的反应并不频繁，观察者几乎对一半的疼痛实例只是目睹而没有反应。对疼痛做出反应的观察者对患者表现出总体上缺乏同理心。这些发现揭示了儿童流行媒体中呈现的疼痛描绘非常狭窄，疼痛总体上被低估，对疼痛的许多适应不良描绘，以及患者和观察者反应中的性别差异。这项研究强调了需要进一步研究，以了解父母和儿童如何看待儿童流行媒体，以及如何改变和利用媒体进行有效的儿童疼痛教育。
