Nowadays films occupy a significant portion of the media products consumed by people. In Russia, cinema is being considered as a means of individual and social transformation, which makes a contribution to the formation of the Russian audience’s outlook, including their attitudes towards topical social issues. At the same time, the question of the effectiveness of films’ impact remains an open question in psychological science. According to the empirical orientation of our approach to the study of mass media influence, our goal was to obtain new data on the positive impact of films based on specific experimental research. The task was to identify changes in the attitudes of young people, as the most active viewers, towards topical social issues after watching a specifically selected film. Using a psychosemantic technique that included 25 scales designed to identify attitudes towards elderly people, respondents evaluated their various characteristics before and after watching the film. Using a number of characteristics related to the motivational, emotional and cognitive spheres, significant changes were revealed. At the same time, significant differences were found in assessments of the elderly between undergraduate students and postgraduate students. After watching the film, postgraduate students’ attitudes towards elderly people changed in a positive way, while undergraduate students’ negative assessments only worsened. The revealed opposite trends can be explained by individual differences of respondents, which include age, educational status as an indicator of individual psychological characteristics, the experience of interaction with elderly people and, as a result, attitudes towards elderly people at the time before watching the movie. The finding that previous attitudes mediate the impact of the film complements the ideas of the contribution of individual differences to media effects. Most of the changes detected immediately after watching the movie did not remain over time. A single movie viewing did not have a lasting effect on viewers’ attitudes, and it suggests the further task of identifying mechanisms of the sustainability of changes.

Keywords: psychology of cinema, influence of mass media, impact of films, attitudes, attitudes towards elderly people

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1. Introduction

With the development of information technology, a person’s immersion in the field of mass media is steadily increasing. A significant portion of consumed media products is occupied by cinema. According to sociological surveys, going to the cinema is the most popular way of spending leisure time in Russia today (http://www.fond-kino.ru/news/kto-ty-rossijskij-kinozritel/); the audiences of cinemas are growing, the core of which are 18-24 years olds, as well as the frequency of visits—every tenth Russian goes to the cinema several times a month (https://wciom.ru/index.php?id=236&uid=1785; https://wciom.ru/fileadmin/file/reports_conferences/2018/2018-04-03_kino.pdf; http://www.fond-kino.ru/news/portret-kinoauditorii-rezultaty-monitoringa-za-i-kvartal-2019-goda/), the opportunities and frequency of Internet viewings is expanding, while interest in TV shows is also increasing. The importance of the role that cinema plays in Russia is also confirmed by the close attention currently being paid to the development of the cinema industry: the priority topics of state financing are defined (e.g., “Law and order: the heroes of modern society in the fight against crime terror, extremism and corruption”, “On the continuity of military generations, on the successors of military traditions”, "Images, patterns of behavior and creative motivation of our contemporary—a man of labor, in the military or a scientist"), while state programs are being launched to open new cinema theatres in small towns. Сinema becomes a “tool for broadcasting state ideology to the masses” (according to S. Zizek [1]), and is also being considered as a “means of individual and social transformation” (according to T. Kashani [2]) [3]. As a result, films are expected to form beliefs, influence opinions and change attitudes, including towards topical social issues.

However, the question of the efficiency of films remains open in psychology. In general, this is a key issue for mass communication research: how much emotion, cognition and behavior are changed under the influence of mass media [4,5]. There are various concepts about this: from “theories of a minimal effect” to “theories of a strong effect” [6]. Thus, for example, cultivation theory considers that mass communication contributes to the assimilation of commonly accepted values, norms and forms of behavior [7]; and a meta-analysis of studies leads to the conclusion that there is a relationship between the broadcast mass media image of reality and people’s attitudes towards it [8,9]. Despite criticisms, cultivation theory is currently being developed [10,11,12,13]. On the other hand, supporters of the opposite viewpoint point out the weak effects of mass communication, caused, for example, by the fact that people are becoming more and more subject of their mass media activity as a result of a wider variety of sources of information now and expanding their choices [14,15].

It seems difficult to identify a single mechanism of mass media impact on the human psyche and behavior and to obtain an unambiguous answer to the question about its efficiency [6]. This is due to the interconnection of various factors that mediate the influence of mass media (personal experience, realistic content, depth of identification with heroes, personality traits, etc.) [16,17,18], as well as those factors that constantly impact persons besides those in the media. Therefore, our thoughts and ideas about this issue are largely based on empirical research data, and are not limited to one theory [19].

When referring to research of cinema, we can find data on the diverse effects of film exposure. It should be noted that the effectiveness of the impact is determined by what it is directed at: it is more difficult to change human behavior than to influence opinions or attitudes [4,6]. In this regard, there is still a debatable problem on the influence of the media on the aggressive behavior of people [20]. This research focuses on the potential of pro-social, "humanistic" impact of films and their effectiveness in solving topical social issues. The studies reveal the influence of films on people’s beliefs and opinions, stereotypes and attitudes. Movies can have a significant impact on gender and ethnic stereotypes [21,22], change attitudes towards certain groups of people and cause newly formed opinions on various issues. For example, HIV films contributed to sympathy to people living with HIV [4], TV series with transgender characters contributed to positive attitudes towards transgender persons [23]; the portrayal of mental disorders in movies had an effect on people’s knowledge about and attitudes toward the mentally ill [24,25]. Also, viewing an empathy-arousing film about immigrants induced more positive attitudes toward them [26], and watching a movie offering a positive depiction of gay men reduced homophobia [27]. Other films influenced people’s attitude towards smoking and their intentions to quit [28,29], while a series with a positive donation message helped viewers to make decisions about their own donation [30]. It has been shown that emotional involvement in viewing, evaluated using surveys drawing on theories of social learning and social representations, increases the effectiveness of influence [30]; immersion in narrative, that correlates with the need for cognition, and is characterized by a shift of focus from the real world to the depicted one, explains the power of impact within the framework of transportation theory [31,32].

Cinema can change people’s opinions on specific issues without affecting more stable constructs: for example, the film “JFK” dedicated to the Kennedy assassination influenced judgments about the causes of this crime, but generally did not change the political beliefs of the audience [33]; at the same time, the movies “Argo” and “Zero Dark Thirty” changed viewers’ opinions about the U.S. government that reflected in an improvement in sentiments about this government and its institutions [34]. Movies create images of other countries and stimulate interest in them. For example, European films shaped young viewers’ ideas about other European countries—such results were obtained in a study of the role of films and series in the daily life of young Germans through interviews and focus groups [35]. Another study showed that whether the movies were violent, scary or happy, the more the viewers were immersed in the stories, the more favorable impressions they had of the places featured in them [36].

Various positive effects of films on children and adolescents were revealed. Dramatic films taught teenagers about social interaction with the opposite sex and adults [37], had a positive impact on their self-concept [38], and, as shown by experiments, increased ethnic tolerance [39]; humanistically oriented movies improved skills of children in communicating with peers, increased their desire to help and understand others [40,41].

One of the prime examples of positive impact is Cli-fi movies, which clearly show what we can expect in the near future, and offers ways to think about what can be done to avoid the darkest predictions. Thus, after watching the film “The Day After Tomorrow” (2004), viewers recognized their responsibility for the Earth’s ecology and the need to change consumer attitudes towards nature [42]. In general, the screening of films on climate issues increases the number of online requests and media discussions on these issues [43].

It should be noted that when analyzing the impact of films, conclusions about their effectiveness are the result of different methodological approaches, which have varying advantages and limitations. Content analysis reveals the images, attitudes, stereotypes broadcast by films (e.g., stereotypical portrayals of India [44], or images of scientists and current scientific ideas [45]) on large data sets; however, questions remain about effectiveness, strength and sustainability of the impact on the audience. The influence of films can be investigated through a survey of viewers; based on this, conclusions are drawn about the links between a person’s attitudes and his/her viewer experience, such as in the study of gender attitudes and their correlations with teen movie-viewing habits [21]. In experimental studies, exposure effects are detected using pre- and post-film questionnaires; however, the time interval between testing and a film screening, such as a few weeks before viewing the film or a several days after [26,27,29], can lead to distortion of the results that are caused by the influence on the viewers’ attitudes of other factors besides the film; moreover, usually it is not investigated whether new attitudes are retained over time. Often the effects of films are analyzed in experimental conditions where participants watch only short cut scenes from existing films [24], which limits the extrapolation of the results.

According to the empirical orientation of our approach, the goal was to obtain new data on the positive impact of films based on a specific experimental study. The task was to identify changes in young people’s attitudes towards topical social issues after watching a specifically selected film. Participants had to watch the full version of an existing fiction film. They were tested just before and immediately after watching the movie in order to avoid the influence of other variables on viewers’ attitudes. Repeated testing (two weeks after the first viewing) was intended to reveal the sustainability of the changes caused by the film.

In the process of developing the design of the work, it was specified what attitudes would be studied. The choice was determined, first of all, by the social relevance of the topic, but outside the focus of the media in order to reduce the impact of other media sources, and on the other hand, by the availability of a suitable film. Important topics as ethnic stereotypes, attitudes toward people with disabilities, etc. were considered. However, the choice of the topics had to be restricted for various reasons. For example, identifying attitudes toward certain professions (e.g., engineer), whose prestige has significantly declined in Russia in recent decades, was difficult due to the lack of relevant films popularizing them. At the same time, despite the availability of humanistically oriented films dedicated to people with disabilities, the identification of changes in attitudes to them was complicated by the need to take into account additional factors caused by increased attention to the topic and active discussion in various media, which could distort the influence of a film.

Given the limitations and opportunities for the implementation of research tasks, the subject of this study the attitudes towards elderly people. At present, attention to the topic concerning elderly people is growing in Russia, but there is still a prevalence of negative stereotypes [46]. A characteristic manifestation of age discrimination against the elderly—ageism—is a biased attitude towards them, especially among young people, as well as a low assessment of their intellectual abilities, activity and "usefulness" for society.

Studies show that the mass media have a significant impact on negative attitudes towards the elderly [47]: children have already demonstrated the same stereotypes of the elderly that were depicted in the media [48], while young people at large viewed the elderly in general as ineffective, dependent, lonely, poor, angry and disabled, which corresponded to the negative representations of elderly people in the most popular teen movies that cultivated their stereotypes [49]. Research of TV films from the 1980s–1990s revealed the stereotypes of elderly people as being social outsiders [50], but at the same time a display of positive prejudice contributed to an increase in tolerance towards them within society.

Improving the attitudes of young people towards elderly people is an important social and educational task, the solution of which involves the use of diverse opportunities. Various social projects can be implemented for this purpose, for example, "friendly visitor" types of programs in which young people visit the elderly [51,52], but also mass media, including films, which have a high potential for impact [53,54]. It was found that watching documentary films had a positive effect on both knowledge about aging and attitudes towards the elderly [55]; these films significantly improved empathy towards elderly people among university students [56].

We suggested that fiction movies, popular especially among young people, could contribute to changing existing biased attitudes towards elderly people. Based on this, the hypothesis states that there is a connection between watching a positive film about the elderly and changes in young people’s attitudes towards them in a positive way.

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2. Methods

2.1. Participants

A total of 70 individuals participated in this study. Group one contained 40 students of The State Academic University for Humanities (25% male and 75% female). The average age was 19 (M = 19, standard deviation SD = 2.4). Group two consisted of 30 postgraduate students from Russian Academy of Sciences (47% male and 53 % female). The average age was 24 (M = 24, standard deviation SD = 1.6).

All subjects gave their informed consent for inclusion before they participated in the study. The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and was approved by the local ethics committee (Review Board).

2.2. Materials

2.2.1. Film The film—“The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” (2011), the main characters of which were elderly people, was chosen to be shown to the respondents (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1412386/). Prior to this, a qualitative analysis of empirical material revealed the impact of this film on the attitudes towards elderly people among Russian viewers of different ages. Their reviews on the film, taken from Internet resources devoted to cinema, indicated cognitive effects, expressed in positive changes of ideas about the elderly; the film was perceived quite optimistically and gave hope [19]. It was supposed that the movie that humorously shows various situations happening to the elderly heroes would also affect the opinion of young people about elderly people, as it allowed to look at them from new viewpoints, to see that age is not an obstacle to having a full life, and even, conversely, open up new prospects.

2.2.2. Measures To achieve the goal of the study, a psychosemantic approach is used, which is the most appropriate for studying a person’s attitudes towards various objects of reality by reconstructing individual meanings [57]. This approach allows us to determine the differences in evaluations of the same object (caused by mass media as well), made by different groups of respondents at different times. For example, changes in the stereotypes of viewers were revealed in relation to representatives of another nation (Russians about the Japanese) during viewing of a TV show [57]. In this work, the psychosemantic technique was used, developed specifically to identify attitudes towards the elderly (based on the Kelly’s Repertoire lattice method) [46]. The technique included 25 7-point scales, according to which respondents rated elderly people. For comparative analysis, the modern youth were evaluated by participants with the same scales.

The respondents also noted the frequency of watching movies ("every day"/"several times a week"/"several times a month"/"several times a year and less"), and evaluated the level of enjoying the film shown ("did not like"/"rather did not like than liked"/"rather liked than disliked"/"liked").

2.3. Procedure

The study was conducted in three stages: the respondents filled out the psychosemantic test before watching the film, then immediately after viewing and again in 2 weeks. During stage 3, only group one participated in the study.

The respondents did not see the film before participating in the study.

2.4. Statistical Methods

In accordance with the data characteristics, non-parametric comparative methods were used. To determine the differences in the assessments before and after watching the movie, the Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used. To determine the differences in the assessments between different groups of respondents, the Mann-Whitney U test was used. The IBM SPSS Statistics 20 statistical software package was used for data processing.

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3. Results and Discussion

As a result of the preliminary data analysis of the group one (students), significant differences were obtained in the assessments given by them to the elderly before and immediately after watching the movie (Wilcoxon signed-rank test, p < 0.05). However, the analysis of the combined sample (students and postgraduate students) did not reveal such significant differences. Therefore, it was decided to compare the assessments of these two groups of respondents. It appeared that the evaluation of elderly people differed among students and postgraduate students before the film was shown (18 of 25 scales, Mann—Whitney test, p < 0.05). This result could be explained by the individual differences of the participants (students and postgraduates), which led to the necessity to correct the hypothesis and form additional research tasks, including the comparison of groups. Further analysis was carried out separately for each group of respondents, but not for the united group.