Research Methods Assignment

Sexual Priming, Physical Attractiveness, and the Media: An Analysis

A Prior Student

Florida International University

Abstract

Methods One Students: Typically, authors add their abstract for the paper here on the second page. As you can see, the abstract for this paper is missing. Your job is to supply that abstract!

Read over the following paper, which is an actual paper turned in by a former student taking

Research Methods and Design II at FIU. This is similar to a paper you will write next semester.

Review the studies in this paper, and spot the hypotheses, independent and dependent variables, participants, results, and implications, and write it up in one paragraph (no more than 200 words maximum). Make sure to include keywords as well (keywords are words or short phrases that researchers use when searching through online databases like PsycInfo – they need to be descriptive of the paper, so come up with three or four that seem to suit this paper). Good luck!

Keywords: Methods II Paper, Abstract Assignment, Methods II Preview

Sexual Priming, Physical Attractiveness, and the Media: An Analysis

Imagine watching the news and seeing a picture of a man with a ski mask and knife in hand. What words that come to mind with regard to this mental image? Might the man to be a murderer? Do words like “scary,” “frightening,” and “dangerous” arise unbidden? Media outlets like the news, movies, and T.V. shows off paint the image of a serial killer as one with a ski mask and knife. People have been primed to make these associations to then respond accordingly, perhaps in fear, shock, or caution. Priming is when a stimulus, in the form of a cue, triggers a reaction in our cognition and releases as set of subsequent behavior (White, Danek, Herring, Taylor, & Crites, 2018). According to Alhabash, McAlister, Wonkyung, Lou, Cunningham, Quilliam, and Richards (2017), priming makes it so that, after a participant is exposed to a cue, they respond to the following stimulus with the information related to and triggered by the cue to then make decisions. Now, if the cues were sexually-implicit, would it provoke a pattern of similarly sexual thoughts and concepts? What, then, are the effects of sexually-primed advertisements on an individual’s judgment of character?

Alhabash et al. (2017) reported that there are about a billion people who use social networking sites like Facebook daily. As a result, marketers, particularly those in the alcohol business, are making the switch and investing more of their resources into advertising on social media, where it is both cost-effective and less-restrictive. The authors found that alcoholic ads promoted drinking behavior in those who were already predisposed to drinking at a moderate to high level. In this case, exposure to the ads served as catalysts to those who had a lower threshold and sensitivity to alcoholic cues. Their findings highlight the power of suggestion in influencing behavior.

A similar study on suggestibility and media priming is by Harris, Bargh, and Brownell (2009) on food advertisements. In their research, they conducted two studies, one on children and one on young adults, and measured how food-related commercials impacted subsequent food consumption. Both the children and adults consumed significantly more food after watching advertisements about food. From their results, they concluded that food advertisements can prime and trigger automatic eating responses, usually unknowingly, and warned about the significant implications. Again, most of the participants reported that they did not know that they were being primed to consume food, meaning that a lot of the priming was unconscious and automatic.

To reiterate, priming is when concepts in our mind are activated through a stimulus, and researchers then study the effects of priming in a following assessment. In this process, the individual is unaware of the activated cognition and associations they make thereafter, however, their behavior is due to the prime (Harris, Bargh, & Brownell, 2009). In a study by Aubrey, Gamble, and Hahn (2017), participants were randomly subjected to either self-sexualizing music videos or neutral videos of the same artist and asked to rate their opinions on scales. By selfsexualizing, they meant that the performing artist would willingly dress in scantily clad clothing and behave in a sexually provocative manner. The researchers believed that the media cues would activate schemas in the participant’s mind and alter their opinion of others. They further hypothesized that those in the sexual condition would have more sexualized thoughts than those in the neutral condition. Their hypothesis was supported, and their results aid in magnifying the effect of sexual cues in eliciting sexual thinking.

Sexual cues litter the online and virtual world around us, acting as elicitors and reinforcers towards attitudes in favor of sexual promiscuity and openness (Dillman Carpentier, 2017). As Dillman Carpentier notes, sexual cues are not limited to images alone: sexually-implicit words have also been shown to be effective in influencing an individual’s point of view on a subject. She further examined the effects of sexual versus romantic word cues on an individual’s rating towards a neutral target and found that those in the sexual condition rated the target as more flirtatious and alluring than those in the romantic condition. This provides further evidence that a sexual cue can prime the mind to unknowingly characterize a subject as sexual. In another example, people who watched sexual popular music would then judge others through sexual filters and evaluate them on sexual characteristics (Dillman Carpentier, 2017).

Study One

Having in mind the effects of mere suggestion, mere exposure, and advertisement priming, we came up with a research study that looked at the effects of primed advertisements on judgment of character. In our study, we presented our participants to Riley, a fake Facebook profile, and asked them to read Riley’s “about me” and rate them based on questions regarding their personality. We had one independent variable with three conditions, each having a different advertisement theme, either sexual, romantic, or education (neutral) in nature, to see how responses changed depending on the images provided. We had two main predictions. One, we hypothesized that individuals who saw the sexualized advertisements accompanying a fake Facebook profile would view the Facebook user in a more sexualized manner (more flirtatious, seductive, sexy and provocative) than participants who saw romantic or educational advertisements. Two, we hypothesized that participants who saw romance advertisements accompanying the fake Facebook profile would view the Facebook user in a more romantic manner (more sensitive, kind, tender, and sentimental) than participants who saw sexualized or educational advertisements.

Methods Study One

Participants

At Florida International University, a total of 138 students participated in this research study. The age range of the participants was from 17 to 59 years old (M = 25.12, SD = 7.58). Out of 138 students, 73 (52.9%) were male, 61 (44.2%) were female, and 4 (2.9%) were unidentified (as they did not mark their gender). A total of 40.6% (n = 56) were Hispanic, 25.4% (n = 35)

Caucasian, 18.1% (n = 25) African American, 5.8% (n = 8) Asian American, 2.9% (n = 4) Native

American, and 7.2% (n = 10) did not identify with these categories and marked “other”. See Appendix A.

Materials and Procedure

Consent was obtained orally, and participants were informed about the study in terms of benefits, risks, and study duration. We told participants that the study would take about five to ten minutes to finish and that there were no risks to partaking in the study. Furthermore, we said that the main benefit would be that we, the researchers, would be able to finish our assignment. Those who answered yes were given one of the three surveys, each one made up of six-parts. The six parts were marked accordingly throughout the document- e.g., Part I, II, III, IV, V, and VI.

In part one, readers were told that the research study was on the probability of a new Facebook dating option. Participants were instructed to read everything on the Facebook page because they would have to remember what they read and answer questions. They were then asked to imagine that they were single as they read about “Riley Washington” and their Facebook profile page. Riley is a made-up character; whose name and biography are purposefully neutral. Their name can be either masculine or feminine and their interests are generic and broad. In all three versions, participants were shown the same banner, a background image of a sunset on an ocean with palm trees overlapping the image. Everything on the page was made to emulate an authentic Facebook profile “About Me” page except that it excluded an image of Riley (Because the survey was testing a new dating feature in Facebook, we kept Riley gender-neutral in our stimulus materials to avoid potential confounds related to participant gender). In their “About Me”, Riley refers to themselves as a laid-back person who is funny, social, open-minded, and “up for anything.” Riley doesn’t show preference for things like music but rather, says that they’d “generally give any music a chance”. They write about how they are open to doing all kinds of things from different extremes such as going out to a club or staying at home watching a movie. We intended this to make Riley seem as neutral-minded as possible. Each survey conditions contained the same information about Riley, however, each one contained a different advertisement theme (sexuality, romance, or education) at the bottom of the page which led to a difference in responses.

In the sexuality priming condition, there were three advertisements under Riley’s profile with images meant to promote sexuality and promiscuity. In the first image there was a man spraying on Axe, a body spray, well-known for making provocative ads about “hot” woman and physical attraction. The ad alluded that the man was naked, with a smug smile as a woman was hugging him from behind (although it is not shown, the image suggests that the woman was also naked). The next image showcased a woman with high heels, a tight dress, and alcohol positioned towards a faceless man sitting in a chair with a drink in hand as well. The last image was a close-up of a shirtless woman, looking at the camera as she is being embraced by a shirtless man, while the words “Gucci Guilty” span over her. All the ads in this condition imply sexuality. The “AdChoices” logo and symbol was made visible throughout the ads to indicate that the following images were meant to be online advertisements.

In the romance ad condition, (just as in the sexuality condition) there were three advertisements placed at the bottom of Riley’s profile. They were the same size as in the sexual condition. The first ad was from Sandals, a resort known to make advertisements about the

“perfect romantic vacation”. In the image there was a smiling couple, celebrating a romantic dinner together outdoors. The advertisement in the middle also showed a couple, this time riding horses together. The last advertisement, was from e-Harmony, an online dating site. In the picture, there was a smiling couple embracing each other. Likewise, as in the sexual condition, there was the “AdChoices” logo made visible.

In the education ad condition, there are three ads, sized and placed in the same way as the other two conditions. The ads in this condition are oriented towards education, adorned with words like “go greater”, “reinvent yourself”, and “start your child off with a strong academic foundation”, accordingly from left to right. In all the ads there are signs promoting colleges such as the University of Florida and Platt College. The “AdChoices” sign, again, can be seen at the corner of the ads.

After reading about Riley, participants proceeded to part two of the study where they were given 10 questions and asked to rate their impressions of Riley from a scale of 1 (“Strongly Disagree”) to 6 (“Strongly Agree”). We asked participants to rate the statements “Riley seems”: educated, flirtatious, sensitive, seductive, kind, tender, sentimental, provocative, outgoing, and sexy. For our study, we primarily focused on the participant’s response regarding whether they though Riley seemed provocative and whether they thought Riley seemed sensitive. The remaining impressions ratings were included primarily to mask the goal of our study, which was focused on sexuality impressions. As such, they are not discussed further.

In part three, we asked participants to rate how well the following 10 statements describe them and recorded their answers on a scale from 1 (“Strongly Disagree”) to 6 (“Strongly Agree”). Participants were asked to rate how assertive, sensitive, confident, emotional, businesslike, romantic, decisive, understanding, fearless, and warm-hearted they think they are. Once again, these items were primarily used to mask the presence of our true study goal: looking at impressions of the Facebook user. Participant self-ratings are this not discussed further.

In part four, participants were asked to fill out their demographic information such as their gender, age, race/ethnicity, first language (whether English was their first language or not), relationship status, and student status (whether they were an FIU student or not). Part five asked participants whether they thought that Riley was a male, female, or unknown. Lastly, part six was our manipulation check where we asked participants to recall whether the general theme of the three advertisements they saw was “focused on sexuality”, “focused on romance”, or “focused on education”. Participants were then debriefed on the true purpose of the study, our aim, and our hypotheses.

Results Study One

Using priming condition (sexuality vs. romance vs. education) as our independent variable, and whether participants recalled the general theme of the advertisements as our nominal-based dependent variable, we conducted a manipulation check on the nominal data using a chi-square test. The chi square was significant, X2(4) = 202.13, p < .001. Most of those in the sexuality condition recalled seeing sexual advertisements (86%). Most of those in the romance condition recalled seeing romance advertisements (88%). Most of those in the education condition recalled seeing education advertisements (96%). Furthermore, our Cramer’s V of 0.86 showed a very strong effect. These results imply that participants were aware of the advertisements and recognized them as we intended. See Appendix B.

For our first dependent variable, “Riley seems provocative”, we conducted a One-Way

ANOVA using advertisement condition (sexuality vs. romance vs. education) as our independent variable, which was significant, F (2, 135) = 11.16, p < .001. A Tukey post hoc test revealed that participants rated Riley significantly more provocative in the sexuality ad condition (M = 3.60, SD = 1.21) than in both the romance ad condition (M = 2.98, SD = 0.64) and the education ad condition (M = 2.60, SD = 1.10). However, there was not a significant difference between romance and education ad conditions. These findings support our hypothesis that participants exposed to sexualized advertisements are more likely to rate Riley high in provocativeness than those who are exposed to educational and romantic advertisements. See Appendix C.

For our second dependent variable, “Riley seems sensitive”, we conducted another One Way ANOVA using advertisement condition (sexuality vs. romance vs. education) as our independent variable, which was also significant, F (2, 135) = 9.17, p < .001. A Tukey post hoc test showed that participants in the romance priming condition saw Riley as more sensitive (M = 3.90, SD = 1.06) than those in both the sexuality ad condition (M = 3.07, SD = 1.06) and the education ad condition (M = 3.30, SD = 0.92). Participants did not, however, significantly differ in their ratings of Riley’s sensitivity between the education and sexuality priming conditions. Our results seem to indicate that those given romantic advertisements saw Riley in a more romantic manner, such as sensitive, than those in the sexualized and educational ad conditions. See Appendix D.

Discussion Study One

For our research paper, we hypothesized that those exposed to the sexualized advertisements would see Riley Washington, a fake Facebook profile, in a more sexualized view than those given the romantic or educational advertisements. On the other hand, we believed that those exposed to the romantic advertisements would see Riley Washington in a more romantic view than those given the sexual and educational advertisements. We specifically predicted that those who saw the sexual priming condition would rate Riley more provocative than those in the romantic and educational advertisements. Likewise, we predicted that those in the romance priming condition would rate Riley as more sensitive than those in the sexual and education condition. Our results supported both of our predictions. Yet it is possible that the ambiguity in Riley’s gender and lack of a visual image could have played a part in the participant’s responses toward Riley. This could have forced participants to create their own image of Riley using the limited contextual information given, such as the bio and the advertisements, as a rubric for judgment of character. This begs the question: what if we made Riley a female and gave participants an image of her? How would that affect participant’s judgment of character of her in terms of sexuality and attractiveness? That is what we explored in study two.

Study Two

In situations where there is sexually suggestive data, either in the form of an image or word, cues in the mind are triggered (Dillman Carpentier, 2017). Neural patterns of thinking are then activated and lead the subject to make associations based on the triggered cue. For something to be sexually provoking, one could argue that it must be attractive and stimulating to the eye. In the first study, we found that sexualized ads affected participants’ view on our subject’s perceived sexuality. For the second study, we looked at the role of physical attractiveness in judgment of character. We further inspected the relational interaction between advertisement theme and photo attractiveness in ultimately deciding how provocative, or sexy, our subject seems.

Physical attractiveness is positively associated to being more successful in the social world in respect to relational, social, and economic mobility (Little, Jones, & DeBruine, 2011).

Although all physical attraction boils down to the individual and their personal preferences, objective, physical beauty can be measured by gathering individual ratings on the same subject and averaging out the scores (Feingold, 1992). Furthermore, according to Little, Jones, and DeBruine (2011), even with individual and cultural differences in mind, there seems to be a consistent, global agreement on what is generally attractive. Shen, Chau, Su, Zeng, Jiang, He, Fan, and Hu (2016) found that areas in the mind including the orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, and anterior cingulate cortex (areas high in reward and emotion-related thinking) are activated in response to differing levels of attractiveness. There was greater activation in the ventral ventromedial prefrontal cortex (and its subcortical rewarding system) when participants saw a “beautiful” face compared to a “non-beautiful” one: there seems to be a connection made between facial attractiveness and reward (Shen et al., 2016).

There is overwhelming research on the effects of beauty on judgment of character. Cash and Duncan (1984) conducted a study on stereotypes and physical attractiveness and measured the responses of black participants. In their research report, they used images of African Americans who varied in levels of attractiveness from high, average, to low. Their study found that those who were considered highly attractive were rated higher in social desirability qualities. Among these qualities, was the likelihood of being successful in the future both economically and socially, where those in the average and high level of attractiveness scored significantly higher than those rated low in attractiveness. A statistically significant amount of people made the same assumptions and judgments of character based on physical beauty.

In addition to seeming more sociably adept and successful, physically attractive people seem more “sexually warm” than less attractive people (Feingold, 1992). In this context, sexually warm was defined by how sexually responsive a person seemed. Feingold (1992) created a meta-analysis on impression-forming and attractiveness in terms of desirability, popularity, success, and personality and found a relationship between beauty and perceived sexual permissiveness. Participants believed that physically attractive women were more sexually promiscuous than their counterparts.

Alongside to having social benefits, physical attractiveness has probable links to evolutionary and biological functions (Fink & Penton-Voak, 2002). More specifically, facial attractiveness can be measured by facial cues such as the symmetry, averageness, and homogeneity of the skin (Coetzee, Faerber, Greeff, Lefevre, Re, & Perrett, 2012). According to Fink and Penton-Voak (2002), these facial cues serve as markers and indicators of good health and reproductive genes. Rhodes, Simmons, and Peters’ (2005) study on sexual behavior and attractiveness found supportive data on mating success correlated to physical beauty, alluding to a connection between physical attractiveness and sexual desirability. Sexual desirability leading to equally sexually-related thoughts.

In our present study, we extend our first study measuring the effect of advertisements on our fake Facebook subject, Riley’s perceived sexuality. For study two, we removed the romantic ad condition from our first independent variable, but included an attractiveness independent variable, thus giving us a 2 x 2 factorial design. In line with Study One, we predicted a main effect for the advertisement independent variable such that those who saw sexuality ads would see Riley as more sexual and provocative than those who saw educational ads. For our second independent variable, photo attractiveness, we predicted a main effect such that participants would see Riley as more sexual and provocative when her profile picture was attractive compared to non-attractive. Finally, we predicted an interaction between advertisement and photo attractiveness in that participants would see Riley as the most “sexual” in the sexual ad and attractive photo condition than all the other three conditions, though we also predicted that seeing a sexual ad would lead those in the unattractive photo condition to rate Riley as more sexual and provocative than those who saw educational ads.

Methods Study Two

Participants

There were 103 participants in this study. Out of these 103 participants, 31 (30.1%) were male, 70 (68.0%) were female, and 2 (1.9%) were unidentified (they did not report their gender). The participants ages ranged from 17 to 47 years old (M = 22.96, SD = 5.72). A total of 59.2%

(n = 61) were Hispanic American, 18.4% (n = 19) were African American, 11.7% (n = 12) were Caucasian, 1.9% (n = 2) were Native Indian, 1.9% (n = 2) were Asian American, 2.9% (n = 3) of the participants selected “Other”, and 3.9% (n = 4) of the participants did not report their race.

See Appendix E.

Materials and Procedure

Individuals were asked if they would like to participate in an online research study. If the individual said yes, they were given the link to the online survey operated through a software program called Qualitrics. As protocol, potential participants were presented with an informed consent form. Subjects were made aware of the potential risks (where they may feel uncomfortable due to the sensitive topics addressed in the survey, such as sexuality), benefits (they have the opportunity to learn about psychology in relation to social media), and study duration (we told them the survey would take 10 to 15 minutes to complete). Those that declined and did not want to participate were redirected to the end of the survey while those that gave consent were presented to the next page- the “Introduction”.

In the introduction, just like in Study One, participants were told that the research study was to collect preliminary data on a new Facebook dating option. They were given the same instructions as in Study One: pretend that you are single as you read about Riley Washington and make sure to read everything carefully. Similarly, Riley’s “About Me” and Facebook banner in Study Two was identical to Study One, with the same description and backdrop of a sunset on an ocean. However, in this study we removed the romance ad condition and included a new independent variable: Riley photo attractiveness. Thus, in addition to study one’s ad based independent variable (sexual vs. educational advertisements), study two looked at photo attractiveness (attractive vs. unattractive). In study one, we did not include a picture of Riley, but in this study we made Riley an African American female. The two photos chosen to represent an attractive and unattractive Riley were adapted from Coetzee, Faerber, Greeff, Lefevre, Re, and Perrett, (2012). The two images were formed from composite pictures of 10 African-American females rated by participants as the least attractive and 10 African-American females rated by participants as highly attractive. We chose the one picture that most of their participants rated as high in attractiveness as well their one picture that most of their participants rates as low in attractiveness.

Participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions: sexuality ad X attractive photo, sexuality ad X unattractive photo, educational ad X attractive photo, and education ad X unattractive photo. As an example, in the sexuality ad X attractive condition, participants would see the attractive photo of Riley paired with the three sexual advertisements (like in study one) at the bottom of the screen. In all the conditions, the advertisements remained the same as in study one, except that we removed the romantic advertisements.

Once participants finished reading about Riley, they were sent to the next page where they were asked 15 questions about Riley. They had to rate their impressions of Riley on a scale of 1 (“Strongly Disagree”) to 6 (Strongly Agree”), just like in the previous study. Here we modified our questions from study one and asked participants if they thought “Riley seemed”: educated, flirtatious, seductive, provocative, outgoing, sexy, well-spoken, studious, mature, perceptive, popular, intelligent, genuine, trustworthy, and a good potential partner. For this study, we once again primarily focused on the participant’s response regarding whether they thought Riley seemed provocative and whether they thought Riley seemed sexy. Remaining ratings are not discussed further, as they were included to mask the presence of our main goal: focusing on sexuality and provocative ratings for Riley.

Next, participants were asked to rate 12 questions (on a 1 to 6 scale like the one above) on how well the following assertions described them and who they are in their everyday life. They were asked if they thought they were: assertive, confident, romantic, decisive, fearless, intelligent, energetic, friendly, popular, attractive, laid-back, and humorous. Again, we did not analyze these secondary dependent variables, so they are not discussed further.

After completing the participant self-rating, the readers were asked to recall what was the general theme of the advertisements they saw under Riley’s profile and were given the option to click: “they focused on sexuality”, “they focused on education”, or “not sure”. The next question asked subjects to answer on a scale from 1 to 6 (1 being “not at all” and 6 being “very much so”),

“to what extent do you find Riley physically attractive?” Participants answered demographic information similar to the one in study one and marked down their gender, age, race/ethnicity, first language, relationship status, and student status as well to new additional questions pertaining to their sexual preference and sexual orientation (whether they considered themselves transgender or not). Participants were then debriefed and given the real aim of the study.

Results Study Two

Using type of advertisement (sexual vs. educational) as our independent variable, and whether participants recalled the general theme of the advertisements as our nominal-based dependent variable, we conducted a chi square test. The chi square was significant, X2(2) = 82.39, p < .001. Most of the participants who were exposed to the sexual advertisements accurately recalled that the theme focused on sexuality (85.2%). Likewise, most of the participants who were exposed to the educational advertisements recalled condition accurately recalled that the theme focused on education (85.7%). Additionally, our Cramer’s V of 0.89 showed a very strong effect. These results suggest that participants did notice the advertisements and remembered them as we intended. See Appendix F.

To measure the effectiveness of our photo attractiveness manipulation (our IV) on how physically appealing Riley seemed to participants (our interval-based dependent variable), we conducted an independent samples t-Test. The t-Test was significant, t(101) = 14.33, p < .001. Participants who saw the unattractive photo of Riley rated Riley as less physically appealing (M = 1.46, SD = 0.50) than participants who saw the attractive photo of Riley (M = 3.53, SD = 0.87). The data seems to suggest that our photo manipulation was effective. See Appendix F.

For our first dependent variable, “Riley seems provocative”, we conducted a Two-Way ANOVA using advertisement theme (sexual vs. educational) and photo attractiveness (attractive vs. unattractive) as our independent variables. There was no significant main effect for advertisement type, F (1, 99) = 3.54, p > .05. This means that there was no difference between sexuality advertisements (M = 2.94, SD = 1.55) and educational advertisements (M = 2.37, SD = 1.64) on ratings of Riley’s provocativeness. However, there was a significant main effect for photo attractiveness, F (1, 99) = 10.48, p < .05, such that those who saw an attractive photo of Riley (M = 3.11, SD = 1.66) thought she was more provocative than those who saw an unattractive photo of Riley (M = 2.13, SD = 1.39). Unfortunately, there was no interaction of ad theme and photo attractiveness, F (1, 99) = 1.89, p > .05. This means that there were no difference between participants were in the sexuality ad X attractive condition (M = 3.59, SD = 1.55), the sexuality ad X unattractive condition (M = 2.20, SD = 1.19), the education ad X attractive condition (M = 2.61, SD = 1.64), and the educational ad X unattractive condition (M = 2.05, SD = 1.63). See Appendix H.

For our second dependent variable, “Riley seems sexy”, we conducted another Two-Way ANOVA using advertisement theme (sexual vs. educational) and photo attractiveness (attractive vs. unattractive) as our independent variables. We found a significant main effect for advertisement theme, F (1, 99) = 24.90, p < .001, with participants in the sexual advertisement condition (M = 3.39, SD = 1.17) rating Riley as seeming sexier than those in the educational advertisement condition (M = 2.35, SD = 1.25). There was also a significant main effect for photo attractiveness, F (1, 99) = 9.62, p < .005. Participants in the attractive condition (M = 3.18, SD = 1.28) rated Riley as sexier than participants in the unattractive condition (M = 2.54, SD = 1.28). However, both main effects were qualified by a significant interaction, F (1, 99) = 6.42, p < .05. See Appendix I. As a result, we conducted four follow-up simple effects tests for the significant interaction.

Our first simple effects test showed that those who got sexuality advertisements did not differ in their ratings of Riley sexiness in the attractive condition (M = 3.45, SD = 1.21) and unattractive condition (M = 3.32, SD = 1.15), F (1, 52) = 0.16, p > .05. However, our second simple effects showed that those who got educational advertisements rating Riley as sexier in the attractive condition (M = 2.89, SD = 1.32) than in the unattractive condition (M = 1.62, SD = 0.67), F (1, 47) = 16.45, p < .001. In addition, our third simple effects for those in the unattractive condition showed that Riley seemed sexier to those who saw the sexual advertisements (M = 3.32, SD = 1.15) than those who saw the educational advertisements (M = 1.62, SD = 0.67), F (1, 44) = 35.97, p < .001. Lastly, our fourth simple effects for those in the attractive condition showed that Riley received similar ratings of sexiness in cases where participants saw sexual advertisements (M = 3.45, SD = 1.21) and educational advertisements (M = 2.89, SD = 1.32), F (1, 55) = 2.75, p > .05.

Discussion Study Two

In Study Two, we had three hypotheses. First, we predicted a main effect such that participants exposed to the sexualized advertisements would rate Riley in a more sexualized and provocative way than those exposed to the educational condition. Second, we hypothesized a main effect such that Riley would seem more sexual and provocative when her profile was accompanied by an attractive picture rather than an unattractive picture. Third, we predicted an interaction such that Riley would be rated the highest in terms of sexuality and provocativeness in the sexuality ad X attractive condition compared to all others, though the exposure to sexuality ads might increase ratings even for the unattractive photo condition. We measured participant’s responses to whether they thought Riley was provocative and sexy. Although the words provocative and sexy may be similar, we found results where sexual ads made Riley seem sexier but not more provocative, yet when Riley was attractive she was seen as both sexier and provocative. Our results supported our hypotheses. Interestingly, sexual ads made unattractive Riley seem as sexy as the attractive Riley. Yet, when Riley was already attractive, sexual ads didn’t make her significantly sexier than in our neutral (educational) ad. This supports previous research on the effects of sexual priming on judgment making and opens doors to possible research investigating how sexual advertisements affect judgments on unattractive people. Due to the dissimilar results in whether Riley seemed provocative and sexy, future studies should be wary of word usage to prevent further misunderstandings.

General Discussion

In both studies, we found that sexual advertisements caused participants to rate our target, Riley Washington, in a more sexualized manner, particularly sexier. However, our findings in study two contradicted the findings in study one. In the first study, where we only manipulated the type of advertisements that participants saw, those in the sexual ad condition, rated Riley as more provocative than those who were in the education and romantic conditions. Yet, in study two, there was not a significant difference between the advertisement types and how provocative Riley seemed. In the second study, we had added a photo of Riley and manipulated whether participants saw an unattractive or attractive photo of her. Nonetheless, when we examined how sexy Riley seemed, she was rated as sexier in the sexual ad condition than in the educational ad condition (regardless of the photo condition participants received). Photo attractiveness, whether Riley was shown as attractive or unattractive, made a difference in how sexy Riley seemed; Riley seemed more sexual when she was attractive than when she was unattractive. These results affirm previous research by Feingold (1992), who found that attractive women were thought of as more sexually active than woman who weren’t as attractive. Furthermore, as was hypothesized, there was an interaction between ad type and photo attractiveness in determining how sexy Riley seemed, but Riley was not rated as the “most sexual” in the sexuality ad x attractive photo than the other conditions. In fact, there was no significant difference between how sexy Riley seemed in the sexuality ad X attractive photo and sexuality ad X unattractive photo. Sexuality advertisements made unattractive Riley seem as sexy as the attractive Riley, but they did not make the attractive Riley the sexiest.

Conceivably, it seems that sexually-primed advertisements can cause an unattractive person to seem sexier. These findings are applicable in the social context, particularly social media where advertisements are commonplace and many. They support previous research by Alhabash et al. (2017), in that advertisements are highly suggestive and capable of increasing a participant’s desire to consume the advertised product. Again, in a study conducted by Harris, Bargh, and Brownell (2009), tailored advertisements about food made children go out and eat more food. Advertisements are able to favorably push agendas in the marketing field. Sexually primed advertisements could benefit social media marketers and dating applications alike, in that they can make advertisements that further promote sexuality and dating. Furthermore, like Dillman Carpentier’s (2017) use of sexual advertisements and word cues in their study, the sexual advertisements in our study primed participants to characterize Riley as more sexual. If marketers used more sexual advertisements in their applications and websites, they could cause potential consumers to be further interested in the sexual activity advertised.

The difference in responses from study one and two regarding how provocative Riley seemed could be due to a number of limitations such as the change between mediums from paper to digital and the addition of our new IV. In the first study, we made our paper to emulate a Facebook profile and tried to make the advertisements seem as if they were online advertisements. Therefore, with the switch to digital, where the advertisements were actually online, could have affected the results. Furthermore, in study one, students were asked to print out their own copies of the study and were not given any specifications on whether to print the paper in color or black and white. The differences in survey color could have affected how much attention participants gave to the advertisements. In the second study, we made Riley a female, contrary to the first study where we purposely made Riley gender-neutral. We also gave participants one of two images of her, where in the first study, we did not present any. Perhaps, when we made Riley a female, we limited the degree to which straight females and homosexual males could see Riley as “provocative” and “sexy”, in comparison to the first study where we left Riley’s gender and image up to the viewer’s perception. Riley was also made an African American woman, which could have caused some individuals to ultimately see her as less attractive or more attractive, depending on personal preference, and skewed the results.

Further attention should be given to the use of words to describe a person, where in our results, we found a difference in responses between how sexy and provocative Riley seemed. We meant provocative to mean arousing, or to provoke sexual desire or interest; however, provocative can also mean to cause annoyance or a strong emotion in a negative view. This ambiguity in meaning could explain why Riley seemed sexier in sexual advertisements but not more provocative.

In conclusion, these studies open the door to an even greater inquisition, regarding social media and the factors which affect how we perceive others. It is evident that advertisements can impact and either favorably boost or negatively skew one’s image. We recognize that primes work with the intent to trigger and activate cognitions in our mind that were formerly inactive (White, Danek, Herring, Taylor, & Crites, 2018) and causes the individual to think in terms of the associated topic. If sexually-implicit words and images can affect an individual’s judgment of character and cause them to see someone as more sexual, what would be the effect of aggressive and violent words? How about in the context of a political ad, where words are purposely chosen to slander a politician’s image? Nonetheless, these findings are a good starting point; they are indicators that several factors play a role in our decision making, and that it can be manipulated by outside sources in the context of social media.

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Appendix A – Demographics – Study One

Statistics

Gender (1 = M, 2 = F)

Race

Appendix B – Crosstabs and Chi Square – Study One

Condition (1 = S, 2 = R, 3 = E) * Manipulation Check (1 = S, 2 = R, 3 = E) Crosstabulation

Chi-Square Tests

a. 0 cells (0.0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 12.78.

Appendix C – ANOVA Riley Seems Provocative– Study One

Descriptives

Part II: Riley seems provocative

ANOVA

Part II: Riley seems provocative

Multiple Comparisons

Dependent Variable: Part II: Riley seems provocative Tukey HSD

*. The mean difference is significant at the 0.05 level.

Appendix D – ANOVA Riley Seems Sensitive – Study One

Descriptives

Part II: Riley seems sensitive

ANOVA

Part II: Riley seems sensitive

Multiple Comparisons

Dependent Variable: Part II: Riley seems sensitive Tukey HSD

*. The mean difference is significant at the 0.05 level.

Appendix E – Demographics – Study Two

What is your gender? (Please mark one) - Selected Choice

What is your race/ethnicity? (Please mark one) - Selected Choice

Appendix F – Crosstabs, Chi Square, and Independent Samples t-Test – Study Two

IV Type of Ad (1 - Sexual, 2 = Educational) * What was the general theme of the 3 advertisements at the bottom of

Riley's Facebook profile? Crosstabulation

Chi-Square Tests

a. 0 cells (0.0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 6.18.

Symmetric Measures

Group Statistics

Independent Samples Test

Appendix G – ANOVA Riley Seems Provocative– Study Two

Descriptive Statistics Dependent Variable: Riley seems provocative.

Tests of Between-Subjects Effects Dependent Variable: Riley seems provocative.

a. R Squared = .144 (Adjusted R Squared = .118)

Appendix H- ANOVA Riley Seems Sexy- Study Two

Descriptive Statistics Dependent Variable: Riley seems sexy.

Tests of Between-Subjects Effects Dependent Variable: Riley seems sexy.

a. R Squared = .271 (Adjusted R Squared = .249)