When kids watch cartoons, they're following much more than a plot - they're also absorbing cultural biases through the use of characters' accents.
From the British voices of Peter Pan's Captain Hook and the Lion King's Scar to the vaguely Eastern European inflections of Gru in the Minions universe, North American cartoon-makers have used accents in North American children's shows to not-so-subtly indicate which characters should potentially be viewed as suspicious or sinister.
While the use of accents in children's media has been studied previously, researchers at the University of Toronto Mississauga and Utrecht University found that children are clearly developing internal biases and those who are more exposed to "non-standard" accents in their favourite shows are more likely to associate those accents with villains.
The results were published recently in the journal Child Development .
"It's the strongest evidence we have that the media exposure is actually affecting kids' attitudes," says Elizabeth Johnson, a professor in the University of Toronto Mississauga's department of psychological and brain sciences who worked on the study with former postdoc Thomas St. Pierre, now an assistant professor at Utrecht.
Working with U of T Mississauga undergraduate students, the two researchers first examined whether the use of non-standard accents was still present in animated North American children's media. The team analyzed 105 films and series that seven- to eight-year-olds in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) had reported watching.
"What we found is that the bias was still strong, if not stronger," says Johnson.
Then, in a lab experiment, children were told that they were helping to choose voice actors for a new cartoon. They were asked which voice would be better suited to a "hero" or a "villain."
Non-standard accents were overwhelmingly chosen by the subjects to represent negative characters, the experiment found.
"It surprised me that the strength of the bias in cartoons actually predicted the strength of the bias that was shown by kids in the lab," said Johnson.
The fact that the study was conducted in the GTA made their findings especially striking since the region is one of the most linguistically diverse in the world, where many children grow up hearing a range of accents in their homes, classrooms and communities.
In fact, the researchers initially thought the area's diversity might weaken the experiment.
"We thought, if there's any place where this bias wouldn't be so strong, it would be here. But in fact, it doesn't matter," says Johnson, adding that even children with two parents who spoke with accents still showed the bias.
That matters because accent bias goes beyond cartoons.
Research has shown that adults with certain accents can face lower teaching evaluations, barriers in housing and employment, as well as assumptions about competence in the workplace, Johnson notes.
Her own work with children has also found that they tend to prefer local-accented speakers when asked who would make a better teacher or friend.
"There has been a huge focus on improving gender and racial representations in media, but virtually nothing about accents," she says.
For parents, Johnson does not suggest policing screen time. Instead, she advises families to be aware of the patterns and ask questions.
"Kids don't understand it in the same way that we as adults do," she says. "It's not something they can talk about explicitly."
Johnson believes that a bigger responsibility lies with the media industry and producers of kids' programming.
"Children's media is a reflection of society and our attitudes," she says. "It's also not just in children's media, you see it in adult media, too."
The researchers are now looking at the flip side of their research: whether positive portrayals of accented characters in shows can help undo some of the bias other cartoons reinforce.
While their work is still in progress, Johnson says it points to the possibility that media could be part of the solution.
"Positive portrayals might actually mitigate those biases."
