SynthesisFrontiers in oral health2025
Literature review of the portrayal of dentists and teeth in movies.
Synthesis in Frontiers in oral health, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Social representations of dentist and dental treatment in children's animated cartoons.European archives of paediatric dentistry : official journal of the European Academy of Paediatric Dentistry · 2026Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Introduction: There are multiple portrayals of dentists and teeth in movies. It is largely unclear if the literature has investigated these portrayals. This literature review aimed to identify and analyze the themes, narratives, and symbolic meanings associated with dental portrayal in movies from the existing literature. Methods: Online literature databases, Web of Science, Scopus, and PubMed, were searched to identify relevant papers labelled as articles or reviews. Publications were included if they described or investigated the portrayal of dentists or teeth in multiple commercial movies. Publications were excluded if they were irrelevant to this topic or provided commentary on a single movie only. Finally, 7 publications were identified and reviewed. For each publication, its study design, data source, and genres of movies analyzed were recorded. Key findings were reviewed, such as themes or stereotypes identified, positive vs. negative portrayals, and any impact on public perception elaborated. Results: These papers were published between 2007 and 2024. Five of them provided qualitative content analysis, whereas 2 provided quantitative content analysis. Three publications consulted Internet Movie Database (IMDb) to identify relevant movies. Many of the publications did not explicitly report very detailed inclusion and exclusion criteria for the selection of movies. The portrayal of dentists was covered in 5 publications. The symbolic meaning of teeth was covered in 2 publications. (One publication covered both dentist portrayal and teeth symbolism.) Scenes of oral hygiene practice were investigated in 1 publication. Conclusion: The portrayal of dentists in movies has often been negative, which may influence public perception and contribute to dental anxiety. Future research should investigate the impact of these portrayals on audience attitudes and behavior, as this review underscores the need for more empirical studies in this area. Meanwhile, readers should notice that one major limitation of this review is the small number of publications included.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.