Miss World 2013 Megan Young, who represented the Philippines, said the title held a lot of expectations for young women.
"It hurts really, it really does hurt and sometimes you just can't help but cry,” she said.
“I'm sorry I'm getting really emotional because you know I've been through so many countries and it's just so difficult seeing them in this position and you know people are saying ‘You're Miss World you should save the world, and to be honest, we can't really save the world as a whole, we're doing it part by part. We're not Superman. We're human too’."
Carina Tyrrell, Miss England 2014 and a final-year medicine student at the University of Cambridge, argued that beauty "opens the door".
An idea shared by Miss United States 2014, Elizabeth Safrit.
"Miss World allows women the chance to represent their countries,” Ms Safrit said.
“It allows us the chance to lead.
“Miss World is not a celebrity, she is an ambassador. She tells women all around the world again that it's okay to have an opinion. She makes changes happen. She identifies problems and she finds solutions. She changes the world."
It was billed as a discussion about the place of beauty pageants in modern society.
Oxford university student Kate Welsh said she hoped there would be more critical discussion about the annual contest.
"I was a bit disappointed that it didn't have more of a debate… the kind of moral issues behind having what's still fundamentally a beauty pageant,” she said.
“And having women from such privileged backgrounds being supposedly representative of their countries."
The 124 contestants travelled to Oxford from London, where the 64th Grand Final of Miss World will be held on December 14.
