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Media Myths May Damage Your Love Life!

Sitting down in front of your favourite film or taking a read of weekly glossy magazines may actually damage your love life. That’s according to new research undertaken by psychologists at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh.

The team, led by Dr Bjarne Holmes and Ms Kimberly Johnson of the Family and Personal Relationships Laboratory, studied top grossing romantic comedy films and a wide range of popular magazines aimed at both men and women. They found that people’s beliefs can be influenced by unrealistic portrayals of relationships in the media.

Dr Holmes said the findings could have profound implications. “Marriage counsellors often see couples who believe that men and women want very different things from relationships, sex should always be perfect, and if someone is meant to be with you then they will know what you want without you needing to communicate it. We now have some emerging evidence that suggests popular media play a role in perpetuating these ideas in people’s minds”.

And Dr Holmes believes that the research has uncovered an uncomfortable truth.
“The problem is that while most of us know that the idea of a perfect relationship is unrealistic, some of us are still more influenced by media portrayals than we realise”.

Ms Johnson, a PhD student who coordinated one of the studies, found that romantic-comedy films were full of unrealistic expectations of relationships and marriage. “Films do capture the excitement of new relationships, but they also wrongly suggest that trust and committed love exist from the moment people meet, whereas these are qualities that normally take years to develop".

The researchers are now launching a new ground-breaking online study. Anyone can participate in the study which will ask questions about personality, relationships, and media consumption habits.

As a further added incentive, those who take part in the online study will be entered into a cash prize draw for £500. The questionnaire can be accessed by visiting the website below.

This website will go live on Tuesday 16 December 2008.

ENDS/

EDITORS NOTES
For more information or to arrange interviews with Dr Bjarne Holmes please contact Sarah Anne Munro or Peter Aitchison at McGarvie Morrison Media.
Sarahanne@mmm.pr ; 0141 229 6705; 07747 692157
peter@mmm.pr; 0141 229 6705; 07766 111244