The Gender Difference of Impression Evaluation of Visual Images Among Young People

Abstract

Kawaii is a Japanese word meaning cute or pretty. Authors classified this concept into three categories, i.e. the psycho-physical Kawaii, cultural Kawaii and generic Kawaii. Kawaii, especially the cultural Kawaii, could be regarded typical to the female in Japan. But the psycho-physical Kawaii and generic Kawaii may be shared by both of male and female. Authors conducted a questionnaire survey by showing 225 photographs to 89 university students including 54 male and 34 female students. Based on the statistical analysis of data, it was found that female students tend to evaluate the stimuli to be more Kawaii, beautiful and preferred than male students regarding the psycho-physical Kawaii and generic Kawaii. Further study is expected by conducting the comparative study among various cultural regions.

1 Introduction

In western countries, it is said that the beauty is generally more important and valuable than cuteness or prettiness for girls and women, in general. Yomoda [1] wrote an episode in which he was warned not to use the word “cute” for a woman (except a small child). The female editor of a magazine told him that the use of “cute” for a woman may be regarded as a discrimination from the viewpoint of political correctness. In other words, cuteness is valuable only for children. But in Japan, girls and young women put more emphasis on “Kawaii” (cute or pretty) than beauty. The age that Japanese women start using the word beauty is after they have graduated the age of using Kawaii, roughly speaking after their 20s.

At least in Japan, Kawaii can be thought to be the young female culture. Historically, those who have been writing books or articles on Kawaii culture were mostly female and the consumers of Kawaii products and merchandises were almost all young females [2].

Today, Marcus et al. [3] classified “Kawaii” in three ways as the psycho-physical Kawaii, cultural Kawaii and generic Kawaii. Psycho-physical Kawaii is gender free and is caused by such physical features as the small size, round shape and warm color. The concept of baby schema of Lorenz [4] is strongly related to the psycho-physical Kawaii. Cultural Kawaii is the Kawaii-ness found in the fashion of women in Japan. Such women loves themselves wearing Kawaii fashion and some men regards those women to be Kawaii. The use of generic Kawaii is more frequently found among girls and young women and among some boys and young men. In this case, the word Kawaii is generic and is frequently used in many situations by many people especially among young females for describing beauty, attractiveness, and appeal as well as cuteness and prettiness in many situations. Its connotation is vast and seems to be quite situation dependent.

Authors were interested in the gender difference of Kawaii concept, especially the generic Kawaii and psycho-physical Kawaii. Although men use the word Kawaii that belong to these categories, it is not clear if men are using the word with the same meaning with women.

2 Questionnaire Survey on “Kawaii” for University Students

In order to clarify if this tendency still exists in Japan today, we conducted a questionnaire among young people. The research was held as follows.

Informants were 89 university students (the average age was 20.07 years with a standard deviation (SD) of 1.06), including 54 male and 34 female students, all living in the metropolitan areas of Japan within a 30 km diameter. The research was conducted from October to December 2016. Informants were presented with 225 images that included photographs of paintings, female actors, cartoon characters, and other Kawaii related objects or people one by one and were asked the following questions (Q1-3). The 225 images that has been used for the questions was compiled in the Tables 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 for protecting their copyrights or the like.

Table 1. The list of images (no. 1–45).

Table 2. The list of images (no. 46–90).

Table 3. The list of images (no. 91–135).

Table 4. The list of images (no. 136–180).

Table 5. The list of images (no. 181–225).

Q1::

Have you ever heard of the object in the photo-graph before? (Yes/No)

Q2::

On a scale of one to five how do you evaluate the photographic image?

(1 for “Strongly disagree,” 2 for “Disagree,” 3 for “Neither agree nor disagree,” 4 for “Agree,” and 5 for “Strongly agree.”) The ratings were asked in regards to the following aspects.

2-1: Kawaii

2-2: Beautiful

2-3: Preference

Q3::

How would you describe the image with words that you think will strongly match its content?

3 The Results of Questionnaire Survey on “Kawaii”

Tables show some of the results of the questionnaire. The results of Q1 were counted as 1 for yes and 0 for no. Three other columns of the table, “Kawaii”, “Beautiful” and “Preference” is the average rating score on the 5-point scale. Scores larger than 3 means positive answers. The lowest row is the result of the t-test (p value) between male students and female students.

In the results of Q2, we found there are some differences in the feeling of images between young males and females (Tables 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14). Young female students made more positive evaluations than male on “Kawaii.”

Table 6. Simply designed characters.

Table 7. Many colored characters.

Table 8. Geometrical shapes.

Table 9. Sweets.

Table 10. Small animals.

Table 11. Female celebrities.1

Table 12. Female celebrities.2

Table 13. Female comedians

Table 14. General females

3.1 Characters (Tables 6 and 7)

Characters belong to the category of generic Kawaii. Table 6 shows the scores of simply designed characters such as Miffy (no. 4), Hello Kitty (no. 65) and Peko (a mascot character of Japanese confectionery Fujiya) (no. 162), that received the high evaluation on “Kawaii” by both young male and female.

Young female evaluated significantly higher than male in terms of “Kawaii” score at the level of 5% or 1% compared to male. Young female also evaluated significantly higher on “Preference” scores to the Hello Kitty at a level of 5% or 1% compared to male.

Characters painted in many colors such as Peter Rabbit (no. 42) and Disney version of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (no. 203). For Peter Rabbit, female students rated significantly higher than male students in terms of Kawaii, beautiful and preferred.

3.2 Geometrical Shapes (Table 8)

Figures such as spherical object (no. 42), rectangular object (no. 85) and heart shape (no. 213) belong to the psycho-physical Kawaii. Both male and female students rated them as beautiful. Regarding the scale on Kawaii, male students rated significantly higher for the spherical object than female students.

3.3 Sweets (Table 9)

Sweets belong to the generic Kawaii. But the small-sized Japanese confectionery has something related to the psycho-physical Kawaii because of its size. Sweets such as Japanese-style confectionery (no. 22), jelly (no. 50) and shortcake (no. 210) were preferred by both gender groups. But the jelly and shortcake were rated Kawaii significantly higher by female students. The jelly was rated beautiful by both of male and female students.

3.4 Small Animals (Table 10)

Small animals such as the bird, dog and cat are typical examples of baby schema of Lorenz, hence this category belongs to the psycho-physical Kawaii. Figures included Varied tit (no. 79), British Shorthair (no. 38) and Pomeranian (no. 148). Both gender students rated them as beautiful and preferred. But female students rated Viried tit and Pomeranian significantly higher than male regarding Kawaii.

3.5 Female Celebrities (Tables 11 and 12)

Female celebrities are singers and actors including Scarlett Johansson (no. 12), Avril Lavigne (no. 64), Yui Aragaki (no. 165), Audrey Hepburn (no. 49), Mikako Tabe (no. 123) and Ryoko Yonekura (no. 176). In this case, the category is the generic Kawaii.

For all 6 photographs, high scores were obtained for both scales of Kawaii and beautiful. In other words, actresses were regarded not just as beautiful but also as Kawaii in Japan. Another interesting result is that Audrey Hepburn was rated significantly more Kawaii and more beautiful by female students than male students.

3.6 Female Comedians (Table 13)

Female Japanese comedians such as Kazuko Kurosawa (no. 3), Naomi Watanabe (no. 93) and Kanako Yanagihara (no. 126) were used as stimuli. Their photographs will belong to generic Kawaii, if they were rated as Kawaii. Female students rated female comedians as Kawaii and preferred significantly higher than male students.

3.7 Pictures of General Japanese Females (Table 14)

Photographs of general Japanese females such as no. 2, no. 37 and no. 81 were rated Kawaii, beautiful and preferred by male students significantly higher than female students. The reason is unclear but chances are male students might have felt an affinity to general Japanese females because they were recognized as closer to male students.

4 Conclusion

These survey results show that young female students are using the word “Kawaii” as a similar meaning to positive feelings such as “like” or “love.” It suggest the necessity for the future comparative study in different countries. The result of the comparative study may show us the difference of Kawaii-related concept between Japan and other countries.