Teen Gothic

Like everyone already knows goth women are heavily sexualised and misperceived, but ^{every single time} I look for anything goth related on Reddit, I’m just met with so much gross and vile sexual fetish content and it just reminds me all the time, it’s so hard to escape. I literally cannot stand these onlyfans airheads selfishly using the goth label to attract even more internet degenerates to make money and then make actual goths look bad. It’s so enraging since ‘goth’ has been such a big part of me for so long since I was little and means so much to me, just for egirls to snatch it and shit on it, turning me into a walking fucking kink.

Sorry for the rant, I know I made a post a bit similar to this a while ago too but UGH I just cannot deal any more.

Hello! I have something to share that you might find interesting!

I'm here to talk about some results with y'all!!

I posted here (from a different account) a couple of years ago asking for people to participate in a research project investigating the emotional experiences of Goths, Emos, and Metalheads facilitated by their choice in music…

There were three parts to the study, so I'll summarise each.

This might be a long one, feel free to ask questions or discuss in the comments and I'll respond when I can. :^) Let me know what you think of this!! I'd love to hear it.

TL;DR: No difference found in emotional outcomes between alt subcultures and mainstream listeners on measures of before-after preferred music engagement and emotion regulation strategies, however, qualitative patterns were found!

1. Step One: Basic Emotions.

We measured each person's baseline emotions, then asked them to listen to a song of their choice from a list (that was related to their subcultural identity) and measured their emotions again afterwards. This list was built from a small prior engagement group in which people provided the names of songs and artists that best represented their subculture identity- so I didn't just pull the list out my arse basically!

When compared to some 'mainstream' music listeners, each subculture groups' emotions changed similarly in response to their music: All groups reported increased positive emotion and decreased negative emotions. On a basic level, in accordance with previous research, this implies that members of alternative subcultures are able to gain positive emotional outcomes from their music, despite the music itself often focusing on dark themes.

2) Step Two: Emotion Regulation Strategies.

Next, we investigated emotion regulation 'strategies', aka HOW someone uses music or a creative activity to regulate their own emotions. The framework we used defines three types: 'Avoidance', 'Approach', and 'Self-Development'. Somewhat surprisingly, we found no difference in the way that Goths, Emos, Metalheads, and Mainstream listeners employ emotion regulation strategies.

3) Step Three: Qualitative Engagement.

We finally decided to include a 'qualitative' element to the study, allowing participants to type answers and provide a broader and deeper explanation of their emotional experiences in response to music. This was included to further capture more detailed experiences. This is the most interesting part but I can't possibly include all of it! So I'll make some general points.

– All groups noted positive emotions as attractive when it comes to music, although the alt subculture groups seeking cathartic experiences and more complex (sometimes negative) emotional experiences, implied as a sort of musical empathy as part of an emotion regulation process rather than just absorbing the emotion directly from the music.

– The Emo group tended to speak strongly of a sense of introspective relatability, whereas the Goth group spoke of feelings of wistfulness, while the Metal group consistently referred to energy and intensity- these themes were not picked up on by the quantitative measures used in the previous 2 parts, probably because they are quite specific!

– Aesthetic emotions or experiences, often enjoyed 'in and of themselves' were heavily present for the alternative subculture groups here! For example, nostalgia was very prominent for Emos, Metalheads spoke of 'empowerment' and 'strength', and Goths reported very 'art-like' experiences.

– Emos also judged their music as 'sincere' and 'authentic', Goths tended to refer to the darkness embedded in their music as a 'beautiful atmospheric' description, and Metalheads interestingly tended to draw a separation between the perceived and experienced emotions- some would comment that though they could see an 'intensity or anger' in the music, it did not necessarily reflect their emergent emotions.

– Cultural and social elements were also discussed for the alt subculture groups. For example, being a part of a community was a feature that all subculture groups mentioned as an attractive part of the music. This implies that engaging with the music is a sort of social identity-related behaviour that can perhaps contribute to emotional experiences through an in-group enhancement process. The groups also stated that they experienced a reduction in loneliness when engaging with the music, and the mainstream group commented that they tended to use music as a way to connect to society as a whole- indicating some social benefits, with an interesting uniqueness for alt subcultures.

What does this mean together?

This challenges the blanket assumption that dark alternative music is emotionally harmful or contributes to higher rates of mental health difficulties in alternative subcultures. In addition, it raises questions about social identity, and how the sense of community and empathy can be experienced through music. Finally, the nature of aesthetic emotions are important to consider for future research, as they were very prominently discussed in the qualitative section and divided the groups more clearly.

What next?

Aside from the main findings, there were other things that stood out to me as potential avenues for future research:

1. Age. The academic literature often refers to these groups as 'youth subcultures'. Our study found that a decent proportion of people hold these identities into their 30s and beyond, so previous research is neglecting a valid proportion of these groups!
2. Other Cultures. There are many music-based subcultures all over the world, it would be interesting to see how they engage with their music especially through the lens of social identity. This study aimed at Goths, Emos, and Metalheads purely because of the dark or negative music themes and reported mental health difficulties, but upon finding the relevance of the social element of music here, this could be very relevant elsewhere.
3. Mental Conditions and Neurodivergents. When conducting this study, I collected data on mental health status, but let participants state their conditions with a free text box rather than a tick box. At first I thought I had f*cked up a bit by doing this, because it meant it would be difficult to decide what exactly to control for- we ended up with such a range of conditions, but one that stuck out to me was autism because it was very prevalent in our sample (along with ADHD, anxiety, depression, BPD). As an autistic person myself, I found this super interesting, as I can see how interest/sensory-based activities such as music listening could form social avenues for those with autism! This is something I would love to look into more in the future!! (Pls contact me if you want to work on this together because I'm feeling very inspired!)

I had tons of fun putting this together, and I spoke to loads of interesting people. In total, we ended up with 300 participants as so many people were eager to be a part of this!! Thanks again to everyone, very literally could not have done this without you. Shout out to the University of Plymouth for encouraging me to pursue this topic as well. On top of all of this, I was awarded a prize for this project and I couldn't be more proud this work.

It was my first ever research project and there are a LOT of things I would do differently now… We did try to get the manuscript published, but it has so far been rejected once- though we do intend on trying again. This is why I've waited until now to post this. If I ever get around to trying again, I'll share it with y'all.

If you've read this far, thank you! I hope this was interesting for you. Please don't hesitate to ask me questions, I think my reddit DMs are broken but I have Twitter and LinkedIN in my bio if you want to contact me, or simply email me at [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected])

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*Note: I asked mods for permission to post this but got no response; If you'd prefer me to post this in the discussion thread feel free to remove it and let me know! Thx*