Gender portrayal of US children

1

• Gender portrayal of US childrens television
  commercials 50s and 60s

• Kara Chan
• Hong Kong Baptist University

2

• gender role portrayal on television programs and
  advertising content as major source for
  childrens gender role socialization
• Gender stereotyping existed in
• ?the portrayal of roles and activities of
  boys
• and girls
• ?the location of the setting
• ?the reward types

3

• Previous studies
• Studies of gender role stereotyping of
• children commercials dated from 70s
• Patterns (70s to early 90s)
• Research on gender portrayal
• ?male dominance in number and in voice-
• over authoritative role in product
• endorsement in outdoor setting more
• cuts, loud music and active playing
• ?females in home setting more fades and
• dissolves, soft music and quiet play

4

• Historical perspectives
• 1950s a decade in the development of marketing
  to children
• 1968 Action for Childrens Television group
  lobby on restriction of host selling
• 1975s the National Advertising Review Board
  developed a self-regulatory checklist for gender
  portrayal

5

• Content Analysis
• Chulay and Francis (1974) TV ads orienting girls
  to accept traditional feminine roles, as a wife,
  a mother, or a sex object
• Seiter (1993) boys toy commercials depicted
  conflict, pursuit and competition girls doll
  commercials focused on care of family members,
  clothing and home-making

6

• Kline and Pentecost (1990)
• ?play groupings play with same sex
• ?play styles girls interacted with boys
• identified with
• ?linguistic theme scripts for boys ads
• emphasized power, control, domination
• scripts for girls ads emphasized
• motherhood, relationship, glamour
• and attention to physical appearance
• Dominance of male voice-over myth of male voice
  more authoritative

7

• Research question
• How were males and females portrayed in children
  commercials in the 50s and 60s?
• How does the gender portrayal differ with those
  found in the 70s to 90s
• Method Content analysis of TVC

8

• Sample
• N341, unduplicated
• 13 tapes of kids commercials in the Television
  Commercial Archive, Video Resources New York
  (tapes 2,4,6,8,10,12)
• Included toys, breakfast cereals and snacks
  commercials
• Convenient sample

9

• Two levels of coding
• Each commercial, code
• ?Product category, product gender-type,
• sex composition, sex of voice-over,
• location of setting and reward type
• Each central character (a child, adult, or
  cartoon human character appears most), up to two,
  code
• ?Sex, age, role, activity, whether he/she is
  
• authoritative
• ?1/10 of sample coded by a second coder,
• inter-coder reliability ranged from 0.9
  to 1

10
Table 1. Sample profile (N341)
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Product gender type

• 82 (24) for boys
• 48 (14) for girls
• 211 (61) for both
• For neutral ads, 94 features both sexes, 90
  features males only

12
Ad orientation trend
13
Voice-over

• 69 use male voice(s)
• 6 use female voice(s)
• 24 no voice over
• 1 use male and female voices
• Commercials for gender-neutral products used male
  v-o or no v-o

14
Voice-over trend
15
Central characters

• 307 out of 341commercials with CC
• Altogether 593 CC coded
• 402 male CC (68), 191 female CC (32)
• 63 (11) authoritative figures, (14) male
  authoritative figure, 5 female authoritative
  figure

16
Central characters trend
17
location

• All commercials mainly home and outdoor
• Commercials for girls mainly home and studio
• Commercials for boys mainly studio and outdoor

18
Reward type

• Mainly pleasure and practical
• Commercials for girls pleasure (94)
• Commercials for boys pleasure (56) and
  practical (40)

19
Discussion

• 50s-60s Strong male dominance in terms of ad
  orientation and composition of characters
• 50s-80s male to female characters ratio kept at
  21, more balanced in the early 90s
• commercials in the 50s and 60s were
  gender-stereotyped
• The slow in change of the gender-stereotype
  images
• Implication for advertisers be more sensitive to
  the gender portrayal

20
Further research

• A greater sample allowed to generalize the
  findings to all childrens TV commercials from
  the era
• Interviewing advertisers and creative personnel
• ?reasons for the change or lack of
• change in their gender-role orientation
• ?their perceived gender roles of children