Media messages reinforce some gender stereotypes while breaking others, UD researcher says
Contact: Ginger Pinholster (302) 831-2791, [email protected]
Across a range of media, women and girls are more likely to be depicted as concerned with romance and dating than work or school, and their appearance is frequently a focus of attention. Yet, women and girls in the media also often are shown using intelligence and exerting independence, University of Delaware communication professor Nancy Signorielli reported today.
These are highlights from a new content study of gender roles portrayed in six different types of media, conducted by Signorielli for Children Now, a nonpartisan policy and advocacy organization, and the Kaiser Family Foundation, an independent health-care philanthropy.
According to Children Now, Signorielli's study is the first of its kind to look at gender messages across a range of media heavily used by teen-age girls--including television shows, commercials, movies, music videos, teen magazine articles and advertisements.
Along with a companion survey of girls and boys, the research shows that young people today are likely to get conflicting messages about women both personally and professionally. The research produced the following findings:
WORK, ROMANCE AND DATING
---In TV shows, male characters were more likely to be shown "on the job" than female characters: two out of five (41 percent) male TV characters as compared to 28 percent of females, were seen working. In the movies, the gender differences were more striking: men (60 percent) were almost twice as likely to be shown on the job as women (35 percent).
---Men in TV shows were also more likely to talk about work than women (52 percent compared to 40 percent). In movies, women and men were equally likely to talk about work (60 and 58 percent, respectively).
---Women, on the other hand, were more likely than men in both TV shows and movies to be shown talking about romantic relationships: 63 percent of female characters compared to 49 percent of male characters on TV, and 65 percent of female characters compared to 38 percent of male characters in the movies talked about romance or dating.
---In teen magazines, one in three articles (35 percent) focused on "dating," while just 12 percent discussed either school or careers.
PROVIDING ROLE MODELS
---Women and girls in TV shows, and especially in movies, are shown actively using their intelligence (34 percent of female characters in TV shows; 69 percent in movies) and acting independently to achieve their goals (39 percent of females in TV shows; 62 percent in movies).
---TV shows, movies and teen magazines also stress women's and girls' self-reliance to solve problems (35 percent of female characters in TV shows; 35 percent of females in movies; 28 percent of teen magazine articles).
---Teen magazine articles also include a focus on friendship (28 percent), as well as other important issues facing young people today, though with less overall frequency, such as self-confidence (19 percent), sexual issues (9 percent) including sexually transmitted diseases, contraception and unintended pregnancy, and drugs and smoking (3 percent each).
A FOCUS ON APPEARANCE
---In movies, particularly, but also in TV shows and the accompanying commercials, women's and girls' appearance is frequently commented on: 58 percent of female characters in movies had comments made about their looks, as did 28 percent in TV shows and 26 percent of the female models in the accompanying commercials. Mens' and boys' appearance is talked about significantly less often in all three media: a quarter (24 percent) of male characters in movies, and 10 percent and 7 percent, respectively, in TV shows and commercials.
---One in every three (37 percent) articles in leading teen girl magazines also included a focus on appearance, and most of the advertisements (50 percent) used an appeal to beauty to sell their products.
---The commercials aimed at female viewers that ran during the TV shows most often watched by teen girls also frequently used beauty as a product appeal (56 percent of commercials). By comparison, this is true of just 3 percent of TV commercials aimed at men.
An important overall finding is the fact that fewer women and girls than men and boys were represented in almost all the media reviewed. Specifically:
---in TV shows, 45 percent of the characters were female (55 percent were male); ---in TV commercials, 42 percent of the models were female (58 percent were male); ---in movies, 37 percent of the characters were female (63 percent were male); and ---in music videos, 22 percent of the people shown were female performers (78 percent were male performers or actors).
The only exception to this were the teen magazines, which are specifically marketed to teen-age girls: seven out of 10 (70 percent) of the models in the photographs that accompanied articles in these magazines were women or girls (30 percent were men or boys). The advertisements in the magazines were even more likely to feature female models (82 percent) over male models (18 percent).
"The combined effect of these studies provides all concerned about America's girls with a clear agenda: give girls an unequivocal message that they are valued for who they are, what they do, and who they want to become. Media leaders can take pride that they portray many women as intelligent problem solvers, but they should also be aware of how often they just paint a pretty picture," observed Lois Salisbury, president of Children Now.
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