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...Maynard Taylor, 1999; Sengupta, 1995) also examined the portrayals of women in advertising in other countries. On one hand, these images provide insight into the social and sexual values of the societies that they are intended to represent. The number and types of depictions within a given culture's advertising can be indicative of the roles and relative power of women in that culture. On the other hand, advertisements are believed to shape the status and roles of their target audiences, as they also influence the values and attitudes of the society as a whole.
Cross-cultural comparisons of gender role portrayals are an especially interesting way to learn more about the dynamics of two or more cultures. For instance, as East Asian cultures grow increasingly Westernized, the depictions of both genders are likely to be influenced by Western values. Analyses of advertisers' representations of men or women in a culture can offer insight into the evolution of a society's attitudes and values.
The present study was based on the assumption that media portrayals affect how people (i.e., audiences or readers) think, feel, and behave with regard to the subject matter portrayed. There are many research traditions that deal with this phenomenon. In particular, social learning theory (Bandura, 1977) and framing analysis (Goffman, 1974) have been used to garner empirical evidence about whether and how media portrayals affect an individual's consciousness.
The impact of advertising on audiences is often explained by social learning theory or by theories that are based on it. The argument is that, as people are repeatedly exposed to advertising images, they tend to internalize the advertisers' views of themselves and others. The more ubiquitous the images are in advertisements, and the more frequently they see the advertisements, the deeper the audience identifies with the images.
The fundamental notion underlying framing research is the assumption that the media frame reality (in this case, how audiences think about the gender roles) (Bennett, 1993; Edelman, 1993; Entman, 1993; Iyengar, 1987, 1991; Pan & Kosicki, 1993; Price, Tewksbury, & Powers, 1997; Snow & Bedford, 1988, 1992; Tuchman, 1978). Goffman (1974) introduced frame analysis to explain how active audience members frame their realities based on their experiences with media. He defined a frame as "the principles of organization which govern events--at least social ones--and our involvement in them" (Goffman, 1974, pp. 11-12). Entman (1993) also explained framing as a means of selecting certain aspects of a perceived reality to highlight, interpret, and communicate, or to use as a remedy of sorts. In general, results of framing research imply that the frame can directly or indirectly influence judgments about issues whether the audience recognizes it or not.
Goffman's approach is ideally suited to our purpose. Besides having been in use for over two decades, it is not language dependent, and thereby makes cross-cultural comparisons feasible. Moreover, given the differences between the English and Korean (han gul) languages, a language-based comparison would be especially difficult. The differences in alphabet and syntax between these two languages are profound (Hammer, 2001). Goffman's approach not only avoids the language interpretation problems, it also focuses on one of the most (if not the most) significant elements in magazine advertising--images.
Courtney and Lockeretz (1971) conducted one of the earliest studies of the portrayal of women in American advertising based on advertisements in general interest magazines published in 1970. Men in those advertisements were portrayed as treating women as sex objects, whereas women were depicted as extremely dependent on men for decision making and protection. Further, the role of women appeared to be limited to homemaking.
A variety of other studies have been conducted since then. Goffman (1979) published one of the classic studies of advertising and gender role portrayals. He concentrated on images (e.g., positioning of hands, knees, eyes) rather than on words. According to Sirakaya and Sonmez (2000), Goffman's framework "is the only reliable source to date that systematically investigates nonverbal gender displays in advertising" (p. 354). Goffman classified the depiction of women into six categories: (1) Relative Size--Women are shown as smaller or lower than men; (2) Feminine Touch--Women are shown caressing objects or touching themselves; (3) Function Ranking--Women are shown in occupational positions subordinate to men; (4) Family Scenes--Women are portrayed as mothers and caretakers; (5) Ritualization of Subordination--Women are shown in flirtatious or childish poses; (6) Licensed Withdrawal--Women are shown as distracted or not involved in their surroundings. Goffman concluded that advertisements usually depict women as mothers, or as childlike, or as sex objects.
Goffman's study was based on a controversial nonrandom sample. However, his approach has been used widely with different sampling methods to compare portrayals of men and women and to compare media images of White women and Women of Color in North America and elsewhere. The studies discussed later are presented in reverse chronological order based on when the advertisements or promotional materials that made up the data were disseminated. The first group of studies used Goffman's framework. The second set did not, but their results offer insight into cross-cultural gender role comparisons.
Lindner (2004) used Goffman's framework to examine advertisements published between 1955 and 2002 in Time and Vogue. Specifically, the author studied advertisements in Time published in the first 4 weeks of January and June during 1955, 1965, 1975, 1985, 1995, and 2002. Advertisements in comparable issues of Vogue published in the same years were also studied. To increase the number of data points required for a two-way analysis of variance, advertisements were divided into two groups based on publication year (1955-1975 and 1985-2002). Lindner concluded that advertisements in Vogue depicted women more stereotypically than did those in Time. Over the period studied, Lindner observed only a "slight decrease" in the stereotypic depictions of women.
Goffman's scheme was used by Sirakaya and Sonmez (2000) to study photographs of men and women in 53 advertisements for vacation information packages from across the United States, including the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. (The publication dates of the travel literature was not disclosed.) Although the authors found depictions of men that fit most of Goffman's categories, they concluded, overall, that women are still portrayed unrealistically in printed tourism advertisements and are disproportionately shown in stereotypical poses.
Family Scenes was found to be the most common category in McLaughlin and Goulet's (1999) sample of depictions of women in October 1996 advertisements in magazines targeted to European Americans and African-Americans. After Family Scenes, the most commonly observed categories within advertisements in Ebony and Essence were Ritualization of Subordination, Relative Size, and Function Ranking (tied for third place), Licensed Withdrawal, and Feminine Touch (which was missing altogether). In Cosmopolitan, Us, and People, Ritualization of Subordination was the most commonly observed category, followed by Licensed Withdrawal, Family Scenes, Feminine Touch, Relative Size, and Function Ranking. The authors also stated that almost one half of the elements found in the sample advertisements failed to fit into one of Goffman's categories. In particular, they noticed a trend toward the use of full-facial images, where the model looks directly at the viewer. However, this element...
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