Colman Noctor: What does Love Island teach children about relationships?
Liam chats to the Islanders. Picture: ITV
A good love story entertains everyone. The highs and lows of euphoric love and heartbreak have been at the heart of the film and music industries for decades. Children’s animation movies which focus on the ‘true love’s kiss’ as the solution to all of life’s problems have further driven home the ‘true love’ message. But young people have moved on from Disney-type movies and their entertainment demands are much higher. They are no longer satisfied with the ‘prince and the glass slipper’ narrative. Enter
where we see a number of potential princes battling for the affection of a number of princesses, and of course there will need to be some frogs and toads thrown in there to make it more interesting.
Technology has changed the traditional 'romantic love’ narrative in recent years. The hook-up nature of online dating and disposing of people by swiping left and right has impacted how we now view intimate relationships. Teenagers often describe ‘talking to’ several people at once, which seems to be a ‘shortlisting process’. Only after a period of ‘talking’ is someone declared as ‘exclusive’. The days of either ‘going out’ with someone or ‘being single’ seems to have been replaced by ‘it’s complicated’, which seems to cover all kinds of scenarios and possibilities.
Do shows like influence young people’s views of intimacy and loving relationships? A recent study found they are not passive consumers of reality TV. Many understood that reality TV relationships are nuanced and complex, constructed and edited for entertainment value. While I agree that one TV show does not have the power to shape a population’s views on concepts like ‘love’, it's still influential.
Teenagers are savvier than many people give them credit for, but they often struggle to differentiate between ‘normative’ and ‘normal’. For example, if it's believed that sexting is a normative part of teenage sexual development because many people do it, this doesn’t make it ‘normal’ or ‘advisable’.
Because contestants are voted off by the public each week, it would seem the premise of the is not ‘love’ but ‘survival’. This pressure drives contestants to act in less than noble ways to ensure they stay on the show until the end. This could involve engaging in fickle/ disingenuous relationships, emotionally manipulating people and/or strategically misrepresenting their feelings about another contestant to fool others. Some could misinterpret this manipulation as acceptable behaviour in everyday intimate relationships.
In the same way that pornography is a poor educator of loving sexual relationships, may be an equally poor educator of how to behave in emotionally intimate relationships. Most everyday relationships don’t develop at an accelerated pace like the relationships, and they don’t usually contain the same level of chopping and changing views on people you are romantically involved with.
The most important relationship you have in life is with yourself but there is little or no room in fast-paced reality TV to explore this. No contestant in is overweight or has any physical blemishes, and they are not representative of the general population. Perhaps this is not understood by young viewers with limited life experiences. There is considerable evidence to show how mass media affects body dissatisfaction. Girls as young as three years of age have been observed to ascribe positive characteristics to thinner icons (Harriger et al. 2010). Exposure to reality TV shows can lead to body surveillance and body image disturbances, termed “normative discontent” (Erchull et al., 2013).
The evolution of social media platforms has meant that most of us are now producers and consumers of media, often simultaneously. There are many outlets where Love Island-related content can have 24/7 availability for viewing and creation, allowing for exponentially more opportunities for social comparison.
Shows like will not impact every viewer in the same way. Certain characteristics make some people more vulnerable to this messaging than others. Viewers with low self-esteem, perfectionism and who believe that appearance is a core currency for self-worth might be at risk of being negatively impacted by watching shows like .
But this is not new. Advertisers play to our vulnerabilities, creating attitudinal and behavioural change to sell products. Although typically associated with beauty products aimed at females, males are no longer spared this pressure.
The male body ideal is very prevalent in the crew. Almost every male exudes leanness, strength (“ripped”), muscularity and height, which is thought to create the same body image insecurities in young men. Although much less is known about media effects on male body satisfaction, research has reported positive correlations between consumption of media and body dissatisfaction and the use of muscle-enhancing supplements (Levine and Chapman 2011). Experiments have uncovered that exposure to muscular media images can cause male participants to report less body satisfaction (Galioto and Crowther 2013).
Unfortunately, these reality shows, which show a narrow cohort of the population who are conventionally beautiful, may convince young people to rethink their attitudes toward their bodies.
Is Love Island good or bad for our children? Despite the show being compelling viewing for many, the format of the TV show is morally dubious as it encourages contestants to be manipulative and sometimes hurtful to others for the sake of entertainment.
If there are young people in your life who watch this show, it is essential they understand that its premise is survival and entertainment and that the relationships they are observing are not representative of real-life intimate relationships. They also need to realise that the behaviour of some individuals on is not a licence to take the same approach in their relationships.
However, the series allows us to open a conversation about modern relationships with our children. Perhaps we could use this opportunity to talk about the 'Love Island' relationships versus genuine relationships. Other topics for conversation could include contraception, consent and coercive control. Chatting openly about what's happening on could be a way to discuss these sensitive issues in a ‘once removed’ way. And though we are right to worry about external influences on our children's behaviour, the most enduring influence is what they learn at home from their parents.
Dr Colman Noctor is a child psychotherapist.
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