Projcet paper

Killing Us Softly? Investigating Portrayals of Women and Men in Contemporary Magazine Advertisements

Terri D. Conley1 and Laura R. Ramsey1

Abstract Our research aimed to systematically investigate how women and men are portrayed in magazine advertisements, deriving hypotheses from Jean Kilbourne’s observed media analysis presented in her Killing Us Softly film series. A total of 790 adver- tisements in 19 magazines were coded. Results revealed support for many of Kilbourne’s hypotheses. For example, compared to men, women were portrayed as more flawless, passive, and dismembered, particularly in women’s fashion and men’s magazines. Other hypotheses from Kilbourne’s analysis were not supported; for example, there were no differences in the portrayal of female versus male models in defensive stances, as childlike, in bondage, or transforming into an object. These findings have implications for the readers of these magazines as well as instructors who use the Killing Us Softly film series in their courses. Additional online materials for this article are available to PWQ subscribers on PWQ’s website at http://pwq.sagepub.com/supplemental.

Keywords mass media, advertising, popular culture, body image, sex roles, instructional media

Research abounds concerning damaging portrayals of women

in the media (for reviews, see Furnham & Mak, 1999;

Goffman, 1979; Wolin, 2003). These images are associated

with negative outcomes for women including lower self-

esteem (e.g., Martin & Gentry, 1997), poor body image (e.g.,

Botta, 1999; Groesz, Levine, & Murnen, 2002; Halliwell,

Malson, & Tischner, 2011; Lavine, Sweeney, & Wagner,

1999), self-objectification (for review, see Moradi & Huang,

2008), and eating disorders (e.g., Harrison, 1997, 2000;

Harrison & Cantor, 1997; Thompson & Heinberg, 1999). Our

current research assesses media images of female versus male

models and images of women across different types of maga-

zines, utilizing Jean Kilbourne’s (Cambridge Documentary

Films, 1979, 1987; Media Education Foundation, 2000) analy-

ses of the media as a guiding framework.

Killing Us Softly Series and Associated Hypotheses

Jean Kilbourne’s video series, including Killing Us Softly

(Cambridge Documentary Films, 1979), Still Killing Us

Softly (Cambridge Documentary Films, 1987), and Killing

Us Softly 3 (Media Education Foundation, 2000) and 4

(Media Education Foundation, 2010), has been widely used

in psychology of women and gender, social psychology, and

communications courses for several decades to promote a

discussion of how women and sexuality are portrayed in

advertisements. Kilbourne and her colleagues have amassed

a huge number of advertisements, and Kilbourne lectures in

the videos on themes she has identified. Although Kilbourne

recognizes that advertising portrays everyone inaccurately,

her particular concern is that women are specifically targeted,

and targeted in especially damaging ways, relative to men.

Kilbourne is not an empiricist, but she has certainly under-

taken an observational analysis of advertisements. In this

way, her investigations are similar to those of Goffman’s

(1979) research, and thus we believe they can similarly pro-

mote empirical research. In her documentary, Killing Us

Softly 3 (Media Education Foundation, 2000), Kilbourne

generated a number of clear, specific, and testable hypoth-

eses about how women, relative to men, are portrayed in

advertising.

First, consistent with prior content analyses (e.g., Baker,

2005; Belknap & Leonard, 1991; Kang, 1997; Leppard,

Ogletree, & Wallen, 1993; Paff & Lakner, 1997), Kilbourne

reinforces the idea that women are portrayed more passively

and less actively than men. In a related (and more specific)

vein, Kilbourne argues that women are more often portrayed

in physically defensive positions than men (i.e., reacting to a

physical attack—be it playful or threatening—from someone

else). Though the hypothesis that women are portrayed

1 Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

Corresponding Author:

Terri D. Conley, Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, 530

Church Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA

Email: [email protected]

Psychology of Women Quarterly 35(3) 469-478 ª The Author(s) 2011 Reprints and permission: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0361684311413383 http://pwq.sagepub.com

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passively has been supported empirically, little prior research

has compared portrayals of female and male models; more-

over, the specific hypothesis about women being positioned

in defensive stances (as if responding to an attack) has not

been examined empirically.

Further, Kilbourne asserts that women are portrayed in

subordinate roles to men. More specifically, she asserts that

women are more often portrayed in positions where they are

literally physically subordinating themselves to men (e.g., by

serving as a footstool, kissing a man’s shoe) than vice versa.

She also identifies at least five specific instances of figurative

subordination that emerge in advertisements whereby adver-

tisers: (a) suggest either through words or images that women

(to a greater extent than men) should take up as little space as

possible, reduce the amount of space that they take up, or be

as unnoticeable as possible; (b) show women (to a greater

extent than men) with their mouths covered or incapacitated,

suggesting that women should be quiet or silent, or present

advertising copy indicating that women (to a greater extent

than men) should be silent; (c) depict women (to a greater

extent than men) as small children, suggesting that women

should be treated like children; (d) portray women (to a

greater extent than men) in bondage or mock bondage situa-

tions; and (e) directly trivialize or eroticize violence against

female models, but not violence against male models.

That is, the ads depict violence against women without con-

cern for the victim, depict violence against women as

appealing to the woman, or depict violence against women

as sexually appealing.

Although the general issue of subordination of women has

emerged in prior research, we are aware of only one study

that addresses any of these specific types of subordination.

A content analysis by Stankiewicz and Rosselli (2008)

found that female violence victims were portrayed as sexual

objects more than 70% of the time, suggesting that violence against women is eroticized in advertisements. They did not

code directly for the trivialization or eroticization of vio-

lence against women, nor did they compare portrayals of

women to portrayals of men, making it difficult to put their

findings in context.

Kilbourne also makes at least seven additional assertions

that have not, to our knowledge, been addressed in previous

content analyses. (a) She argues that advertisers portray

female (but not male) models as flawless. Kilbourne particu-

larly notes that photos of female models are highly airbrushed

to give the illusion of perfect skin. (b) Advertisers more com-

monly objectify women (relative to men) by showing them

transforming into objects. Kilbourne suggests that women are

literally objectified by making women’s bodies into objects

or making female models look like inanimate objects (e.g.,

a woman’s legs are portrayed as a pair of scissors). (c) Adver-

tisers dismember women’s bodies to a greater extent than

men’s, showing only certain body parts, such as legs or

breasts. (d) Ads trivialize women’s (but not men’s) desire for

power or gender equality; that is, advertisers treat feminism

and women’s desires for equal rights as a gimmick or

inconsequential. (e) Frequent portrayals trivialize eating dis-

orders among women (but not among men) by making light

of anorexia or similar illnesses. (f) Women (but not men) are

characterized as ‘‘gold diggers.’’ That is, Kilbourne argues

that women are portrayed as using men to get to men’s money

or as using their ostensible seductive powers in the service of

material gain. (g) Advertisements mock heavy women (to a

greater extent than heavy men). Kilbourne argues that the

brunt of society’s aversion toward heavy people, as reflected

in advertising, is directed toward women.

In sum, in her documentaries Killing Us Softly 3 and 4

(Media Education Foundation, 2000, 2010), Kilbourne makes

a number of clear, specific, testable hypotheses about por-

trayals of women in advertising. When viewing Kilbourne’s

documentaries in psychology and women’s studies classes,

students who have been trained in the scientific method may

well wonder whether these ideas have been explored system-

atically. Although Kilbourne’s basic premise that women are

portrayed negatively has been supported in content analyses,

most of her specific hypotheses have not been tested. This

lacuna raises the possibility that Kilbourne merely selected

a few extreme advertisements to display in her presentations

but most advertisements are, in actuality, benign. Empirically

testing these ideas adds weight to the discussion of gender

portrayals in the media.

Comparing Types of Magazines

In addition to comparing how women and men are portrayed

in individual advertisements, we also compared different

types of magazines. Considering the intended audience of the

magazine is important for two reasons. First, the audience of

the magazine highlights who is being exposed to the adver-

tisements. Because advertisements affect how people view

themselves, knowing who is exposed to the hypothesized

negative portrayals of women can help focus future research

and interventions on the affected populations. Second,

because advertisers are motivated to appeal to the audience

so that they can sell their products, the content of the adver-

tisements should reflect themes and messages that the target

audience is expected to find desirable.

Kilbourne’s analysis primarily targets women’s fashion

magazines, suggesting that these magazines are especially

likely to adopt ads that are detrimental to women. However,

empirical evidence is needed to substantiate this claim. The

highest circulation magazines directed toward women fall

into two categories: fashion magazines (e.g., Vogue) and

home-related magazines (e.g., Good Housekeeping). We sug-

gest that the messages provided by these two types of maga-

zines are very different. In particular, home magazines cater

to homemakers and/or women with families whose interests

lie in gender-role traditional pursuits (e.g., crafts, baking, and

home decorating). By contrast, fashion magazines cater to

younger, unmarried women with fewer domestic interests.

470 Psychology of Women Quarterly 35(3)

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Previous research has shown that women are more often

sexually objectified and portrayed as victims in fashion

magazines compared to home magazines (Stankiewicz &

Rosselli, 2008). In a similar but more specific vein, we expect

that the most noxious subtext identified by Kilbourne (e.g.,

portrayals of bondage and the eroticization of violence) likely

happens in fashion magazines, rather than home magazines.

Because society generally does not view housewives or moth-

ers in sexual terms (Haddock & Zanna, 1994; Six & Eckes,

1991), magazines directed toward this group would probably

not portray women erotically.

Similarly, advertisements in magazines that target a pri-

marily female audience may differ from those in magazines

targeting a male audience. For example, previous content

analyses have found that advertisements in men’s magazines

portrayed women as more sexualized and dependent than

advertisements in women’s magazines did (Baker, 2005;

Venkatesan & Losco, 1975), which contradicts Kilbourne’s

claim that women’s fashion magazines portray women in a

particularly sexualized way. Venkatesan and Losco (1975)

suggested that advertisers believe that men are more likely

than women to buy products that portray women in sexualized

ways (and perhaps more subordinated roles as well). However,

in their dated study, they did not differentiate between different

types of women’s magazines (home vs. fashion) but rather

compared advertising content of ‘‘women’s magazines’’ as a

group to ‘‘men’s magazines’’ as a group. To the extent that

women’s home magazines are less likely to portray women

in sexualized terms than men, it might dilute the negative por-

trayals of women in ‘‘women’s magazines’’ as a whole.

Indeed, Stankiewicz and Rosselli (2008) found that women’s

fashion magazines included significantly more sexualized por-

trayals of women than women’s nonfashion magazines. Our

current research adds to this previous research by assessing a

broader range of categories and by comparing men’s, women’s

fashion, and women’s home magazines.

The Current Research

Our research directly tested Kilbourne’s assessments of

advertising by analyzing the advertisements that appear in

high circulation magazines. Specifically, we examined

whether women versus men were more frequently portrayed

in the capacities delineated by Kilbourne, focusing on passiv-

ity, the five indicators of subordination, and the seven asser-

tions about women’s bodies, status, and roles outlined above.

We also examined whether portrayals of women were similar

in women’s fashion magazines, women’s home magazines,

or magazines geared toward men.

Method

In this study, we investigated the extent to which themes

related to the subordination and control of women (as out-

lined by Jean Kilbourne) can be found in contemporary

advertisements. We content analyzed all of the advertise-

ments in 19 high circulation magazines from November

2009. We directly coded the content to address the conclu-

sions Kilbourne has drawn in her insightful and influential

but less systematic analysis.

Identification of Magazines

We consulted the Magazine Publishers of America’s (2006,

2008) rankings of magazine circulation to generate our list

of magazines for coding. Our goal was to analyze magazines

with the highest circulation because they are likely to have

the broadest impact. To target deliberate magazine readers,

we analyzed only magazines that were sent to paid subscri-

bers, not those sent to members of groups or organizations

as part of their memberships (e.g., we did not analyze maga-

zines published by the American Association of Retired Per-

sons or American Automobile Association, which are sent

automatically and without additional charge to all members,

even though these magazines have some of the highest circu-

lation rates). Also, we excluded weekly magazines, which

tend to be more news-oriented than the monthlies, which

we targeted. We considered magazine titles from three gen-

eral categories: women’s home magazines, women’s fashion

magazines, and men’s magazines.

For coding purposes, we included magazines that were in

the top five (according to circulation rates) in either 2006 or

2008. Thus, we coded a total of 19 magazines. The six

women’s fashion magazines included: Elle, Allure, Glamour,

Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and InStyle. The seven women’s home

magazines were: Family Circle, Good Housekeeping, Better

Homes and Gardens, Ladies Home Journal, Redbook, South-

ern Living, and Woman’s Day. Finally, the six men’s maga-

zines were: Golf Magazine, Maxim, ESPN, Men’s Health,

Golf Digest, and Field and Stream. We coded the most recent

issue of each magazine that was available at the time we

began the coding process (i.e., November 2009).

Identification of Advertisements and Models

We coded only advertisements that covered at least one full

page of the magazine and included at least one person whom

the coders believed to be 15 years of age or older. Ultimately,

790 advertisements met these criteria and were retained for

coding and analysis: 450 in women’s fashion magazines,

204 in women’s home magazines, and 136 in men’s maga-

zines. To systematically identify which model to code in ads

in which more than one model was present, we coded the cen-

tral or main model. When there was no central or main model,

we coded the first model on the left-hand side of the page.

Coding Process

Kilbourne’s assertions were identified by reviewing her doc-

umentary, Killing Us Softly 3 (Media Education Foundation,

Conley and Ramsey 471

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2000), and establishing coding categories consistent with her

claims. The categories that we used for the current study

(and associated examples) are listed in Table 1. The specifi-

city of these coding categories mirrors previous content

analyses (e.g., Stankiewicz & Rosselli, 2008). Each adver-

tisement was coded dichotomously (i.e., for the presence

or absence of each coding category in each advertisement);

thus, a single ad could have been coded as fitting several of

the categories (or none at all).

Two coders independently coded every advertisement.

Coders were considered to have agreed if they both believed

a category was present in a given advertisement, or, if they

both believed that a category was absent in a given advertise-

ment. However, if one coder indicated that an advertisement

displayed an instance of a coding category, whereas another

indicated that this coding category was absent in the ad, this

was coded as a disagreement. Cohen’s k was utilized to estab- lish reliability between coders. Cohen’s k adjusts for the probability of agreement by chance and is a conservative esti-

mate of agreement among coders. Cohen’s k for the agree- ment between coders was .98. This Cohen’s k level indicates an ‘‘excellent’’ (Fleiss, 1981) or ‘‘almost perfect’’

(Landis & Koch, 1977) level of agreement. Discrepancies

were resolved by discussion between the coders.

Results

To analyze the data, we (a) conducted descriptive analyses

addressing the percentage of ads that portrayed women in

ways consistent with the categories, (b) conducted chi-

square analyses to determine whether women (more fre-

quently than men) were portrayed in ways consistent with the

coding categories, (c) examined differences in how different

genres of magazines portrayed women, and (d) considered

differences between individual men’s magazines.

Coded Categories

The coding categories and the percentage of advertisements

that depicted female models in these ways are displayed in

Table 2. The categories most frequently observed were por-

trayals of women in passive poses and with flawless skin.

Categories not observed in our analyses include trivializing

women’s desire for power, mocking eating disorders, or por-

traying models as gold diggers. In addition, no ads featuring

women displayed contempt for overweight models (although

contempt for overweight male models was documented).

Portrayals of Female Versus Male Models

Female passivity was evident in the ads. Female models

were portrayed in passive positions more often than male

models were, w2(1) ¼ 47.16, p < .001 (see Table 2). Corre- spondingly, female models were less frequently portrayed in

active positions than male models, w2(1) ¼ 45.42, p < .001.

Likewise, female models were portrayed as having flawless

skin significantly more often than male models were, w2(1) ¼ 94.24, p < .001.

Other categories had lower frequencies but still demon-

strated important differences. Surprisingly, men were shown

as submissive to women more frequently than women were

shown to be submissive to men, w2(1) ¼ 6.34, p ¼ .02. Ads with female models were significantly more likely to have

images or print copy implying a need to take up less space

than ads with male models, w2(1) ¼ 4.50, p ¼ .035. Women were dismembered (i.e., by showing only one body part) sig-

nificantly more often than men, w2(1) ¼ 9.19, p < .001. There were no differences between female and male mod-

els in the number of instances of portraying the model in a

defensive stance, symbolic silencing, portraying the model

as a child or childlike, portrayal of models in bondage-like

scenes, trivializing or glamorizing violence, transforming

into an object, contempt for heavy people, or portrayal of

models in traditional gender roles. There were no observed

instances of some of Kilbourne’s categories. Specifically,

no ads that mocked eating disorders, trivialized a model’s

desire for power, or portrayed models as gold diggers were

identified.

Portrayals of Women by Magazine Type

Next, we utilized chi-square analyses to compare the por-

trayal of women in women’s fashion, women’s home, and

men’s magazines. We then followed these analyses with pair-

wise chi-square comparisons to determine which pairs of

magazine types differed (see Table 3).

Women’s fashion magazines. Flawlessness was the only category that was portrayed significantly differently by the

women’s fashion magazines compared to the other two cate-

gories. Magazines differed in their portrayal of female mod-

els’ flawlessness, w2(2) ¼ 37.10, p < .001, such that female models were portrayed as significantly more flawless in

women’s fashion magazines than in women’s home maga-

zines, w2(1) ¼ 36.84, p < .001, and in women’s fashion magazines than in men’s magazines, w2(1) ¼ 7.77, p ¼ .01. There were no differences in portrayed flawlessness

between women’s home magazines and men’s magazines.

Therefore, fashion magazines are the most likely to portray

women as flawless.

Women’s home magazines. For several categories, the advertisements in women’s home magazines were signifi-

cantly different than the other two types of magazines.

Specifically, magazine types differed in their likelihood of

posing female models in passive poses, w2(2) ¼ 30.50, p < .001, and active poses, w2(2) ¼ 30.32, p < .001. Women’s home magazines portrayed female models less often in

passive positions compared to women’s fashion magazines,

w2(1) ¼ 28.72, p < .001, and men’s magazines, w2(1) ¼ 7.08, p ¼ .01. Women’s fashion magazines and men’s

472 Psychology of Women Quarterly 35(3)

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473 at UNIV OF MICHIGAN on June 26, 2015pwq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

magazines did not differ in their likelihood of portraying

women in passive poses. Correspondingly, models were por-

trayed in more active positions in women’s home magazines

than in women’s fashion magazines, w2(1) ¼ 28.68, p < .001, or men’s magazines, w2(1)¼ 6.78, p < .001. There was no dif- ference in portrayals of women in active positions between

women’s fashion magazines and men’s magazines.

Differences also emerged across magazine types in the

extent to which they presented dismembered female bodies,

w2(2) ¼ 7.05, p ¼ .03. Dismembered images were more pre- valent in women’s home magazines than in women’s fashion

magazines, w2(1) ¼ 6.86, p ¼ .01, and in women’s home magazines than in men’s magazines, w2(1) ¼ 11.75, p < .001. No differences in dismemberment emerged between

fashion magazines and men’s magazines. Finally, magazines

differed in their likelihood of portraying women in traditional

gender roles, such as cooking and cleaning, w2(2) ¼ 31.16, p < .001. Women’s home magazines portrayed women in

more traditional roles than women’s fashion magazines,

w2(1) ¼ 28.85, p < .001. Women’s fashion magazines and men’s magazines did not differ in their likelihood of portray-

ing women in traditional roles, nor did women’s home

magazines and men’s magazines differ on this dimension.

In summary, women’s home magazines were the least likely

to portray women as passive and the most likely to portray

women as active and dismembered. They had the highest

percentage of portrayals of women in traditional gender

roles, but this was only significantly different from the

women’s fashion magazines.

Men’s magazines. Men’s magazines had significantly different frequencies for two categories. First, differences

between magazines emerged in the likelihood of symboli-

cally silencing female models, w2(2) ¼ 17.57, p < .001. Men’s magazines depicted silenced female models to a sig-

nificantly greater extent than women’s fashion magazines,

w2(1) ¼ 15.51, p < .001, or women’s home magazines, w2(1) ¼ 11.86, p < .001. There were no differences between women’s fashion and women’s home magazines. Second,

magazines differed by type in their likelihood of glamorizing

violence toward women, w2(2) ¼ 25.70, p < .001, such that men’s magazines were more likely than women’s fashion

magazines, w2(1) ¼ 18.17, p < .001, or women’s home maga- zines, w2(1) ¼ 11.22, p < .001, to use images and copy that make violence seem glamorous. There were no differences

between women’s fashion magazines and women’s home

magazines. In summary, men’s magazines were the most

likely to portray women as silenced and to trivialize or gla-

morize violence against women. No significant differences

across magazine types were observed for the remaining cate-

gories (reactive stance, submissive, taking up less space,

childlike, bondage, literal objectification, trivializing desire

for power, mocking eating disorders, portraying the model

as a gold digger, contempt for overweight people).

Differences Across Men’s Magazines

We examined differences across individual men’s magazines

because, unlike the two categories of women’s magazines,

they varied widely. We found significant differences between

magazines in their likelihood of portraying women as flaw-

less, w2(5) ¼ 22.69, p < .001. More women in Maxim (90%) were portrayed as flawless than in Field and Stream (44%), w2(1) ¼ 9.74, p < .005, or Golf Digest (47%), w2(1) ¼ 8.75, p ¼ .01. Likewise, more women in Men’s Health (84%) were portrayed as flawless than in Field and Stream,

Table 3. Comparisons Among Magazine Types in Portrayals of Female Models

Coding Category

Women’s Fashion

Women’s Home Men’s

n ¼ 422 (%) n ¼ 161 (%) n ¼ 29 (%)

Passive poses 333 (79a) 92 (57b) 24 (83a) Active poses 89 (21a) 69 (43b) 5 (17a) Symbolic silencing 13 (3a) 3 (2a) 5 (17b) Trivializing/glamorizing

violence 0 (0a) 0 (0a) 2 (7b)

Flawlessness 409 (97a) 132 (82b) 25 (86b) Dismemberment 59 (14a) 37 (23b) 4 (14a) Traditional

gender roles 4 (1a) 14 (9b) 0 (0ab)

Note. The percentage of advertisements featuring female models in each mag- azine type that utilize the coded themes. Percentages across a row that do not share a subscript are significantly different. Only categories that demon- strated significant differences are included here.

Table 2. Number and Percentage of Female and Male Models Portrayed in Advertisements Utilizing Coded Themes

Coding Category

Ads Depicting Women

Ads Depicting Men

n ¼ 612 (%) n ¼ 178 (%)

Passivea 444 (73) 82 (46) Activea 159 (26) 94 (53) Defensive stance 0 2 (1) Submissivea 0 4 (2) Take-up less spacea 24 (4) 2 (1) Silenced 18 (3) 4 (2) Childlike 6 (1) 0 Bondage 12 (2) 2 (1) Trivializing/glamorizing violence 3 (0.5) 0 Flawlessnessa 563 (92) 112 (63) Literal objectification 31 (5) 5 (3) Dismembermenta 98 (16) 12 (7) Trivializing desire for power 0 0 Mocking eating disorders 0 0 Portraying the model

as a gold digger 0 0

Contempt for overweight people

0 2 (1)

Traditional gender roles 18 (3) 4 (2)

a Percentages depicting women and men are significantly different.

474 Psychology of Women Quarterly 35(3)

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w2(1) ¼ 11.37, p ¼ .01, or Golf Digest, w2(1) ¼ 10.39, p ¼ .01. No other differences emerged.

Discussion

Our project aimed to systematically examine the conclusions

drawn by Jean Kilbourne in her Killing Us Softly film series

(Cambridge Documentary Films, 1979, 1987; Media Educa-

tion Foundation, 2000, 2010). A total of 790 advertisements

in 19 issues of popular magazines were coded, and our results

revealed support for several of Kilbourne’s hypotheses. As

expected, women were portrayed more passively, less

actively, and as more submissive than men. Ads promoted the

idea that women should take up less space and portrayed

female models with flawless skin and dismembered bodies.

Additionally, women’s photos, compared to men’s, were

more often accompanied by symbolic or explicit messages

instructing them to take up less space.

However, a number of other observations reported by Kil-

bourne were not supported in our sample of ads. For example,

women and men in the advertisements were not portrayed

significantly differently regarding defensive model stances,

the childlike portrayal of adults, bondage, or literal objectifi-

cation (i.e., some or all of the model’s body is transformed

into an object). In general, very few models, female or male,

were portrayed in these ways. Similarly, Kilbourne highlights

advertisements that mocked women’s desire to achieve equal

rights, misrepresented eating disorders, portrayed women as

gold diggers, or displayed explicit contempt for heavy

women, but these themes were not represented. Instead, our

content analysis suggests that these themes do not play a large

role in current advertising in the most widely circulated sub-

scriber magazines we analyzed.

Although advertisements portraying these themes were

found to be rare, they were not nonexistent. Indeed, such

advertisements may be more salient when they do appear,

which could lead to the overestimation of their occurrence;

similar biases have been identified in research from cognitive

psychology (e.g., Tversky & Kahneman, 1973). Additionally,

the salience of these ads may enhance their impact. If these

advertisements are indeed more memorable, then the conse-

quences of these ads, such as the internalization of messages

about violence against women, may be greater than the con-

sequences of other, less memorable advertisements. Regard-

less, the low frequency and similar portrayals of male and

female models for these categories is noteworthy given that

these findings do not support Kilbourne’s analysis, at least

for popular print ads. The atypicality of these themes is a

factor that needs to be considered as we interpret the Killing

Us Softly video series (Cambridge Documentary Films,

1979, 1987; Media Education Foundation, 2000).

In addition to examining Kilbourne’s claims, our data

speak to the differences between various genres of maga-

zines. Specifically, we compared women’s fashion, women’s

home, and men’s magazines. We showed evidence that

women’s fashion magazines and men’s magazines portrayed

women as passive rather than active and physically flawless.

In comparison, women’s home magazines depicted women

more positively in some ways, although they were also por-

trayed more traditionally in terms of work roles. Finally,

advertisements in men’s magazines were more likely to

include images silencing women as well as to present copy

and images trivializing violence against women.

Although women were portrayed somewhat similarly in

women’s fashion magazines and men’s magazines, the impli-

cations of such images in these contexts may be different.

Because viewing these kinds of images has been linked to

disordered eating (e.g., Harrison, 2000), lowered self-

esteem (e.g., Martin & Gentry, 1997), and poor body image

(e.g., Groesz et al., 2002), women who read fashion maga-

zines are at risk for these problems. On the other hand, men

who view these images may be more likely to endorse unrea-

listic standards for women’s bodies (Hatoum & Belle, 2004),

stereotype women (Rudman & Borgida, 1995), objectify

women (Heflick & Goldenberg, 2009; Yao, Mahood, & Linz,

2010), discriminate against women (Rudman & Borgida,

1995), view women as less competent (Heflick & Golden-

berg, 2009), and sexually harass women (Yao et al., 2010).

Thus, reducing the presence of these ads in both women’s

fashion and men’s magazines should have benefits to the

individual readers and to society more broadly.

It is also interesting to contemplate why women and men

are portrayed as they are in these magazines. In some cases,

these results can be clearly tied to the purpose of advertis-

ing—to sell products. For example, physical flawlessness

might appear in a fashion magazine advertisement for a

beauty cream as a way to display the desired (albeit usually

impossibly inflated) result of using the product. Note that

although this tactic might sell the product, it is also selling

a view of how women in American society are supposed to

look. This trend becomes even clearer when flawless images

of women are used in advertisements in men’s magazines;

instead of displaying the results of a product, these women

are used as props to sell products that men are expected to buy

(e.g., women are not using men’s cologne, but women are

often used to sell an image of what a man can expect when

using that cologne). Thus, the connotations of the negative

portrayals of women in advertising are different according

to magazine type.

Finally, our investigation of magazine type questions who

is choosing to expose themselves to these images. For exam-

ple, the main readers of these fashion magazines are women.

Thus, the major consumers of these magazine images are

likely put in the unfortunate position of trying to live up to the

images in the magazines. Given that the circulation for

women’s magazines is far larger than that of men’s maga-

zines, and that these magazines are subscription-based, it

could be argued that women are participating in their own

oppression by exposing themselves to these magazines. Of

course, women are presumably drawn to the content of the

Conley and Ramsey 475

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magazines not the advertisements that accompany the

content. It is not clear from the present work how much the

content of the magazine and the advertisements overlap in

their portrayals of women. Indeed, some kinds of magazines,

such as fashion magazines that include extensive editorial

spreads that essentially advertise designer clothing, may con-

tain quite a bit of overlap, to the point where readers do not

distinguish between content and advertisements. Regardless,

the pervasive advertising throughout magazines means that

resisting exposure to advertisements would require boycotting

magazines altogether. Women likely do have a deep ambiva-

lence about consuming these images as they simultaneously

inspire and demoralize (Wolf, 1991). Much more empirical

work could be done to understand this ambivalence.

Our study focused exclusively on magazine advertise-

ments. Although Kilbourne’s analyses especially emphasize

magazine advertisements, she addresses advertising from

many different media formats. Perhaps the frequency of these

images vary in television, billboard, less mainstream maga-

zines, or newspaper advertising (e.g., weekly inserts by spe-

cific stores), or in the actual fashion layouts of women’s

fashion magazines, which are also a means to sell clothing

(i.e., the designers and prices are always made available to

readers). Content analyses of other advertising media could

help discern how generalizable the present findings are to

advertisements that appear on television, the Internet, and

other media.

The present study sampled magazines with the highest cir-

culation rates. By definition, advertisements in these publica-

tions should have the highest impact because they reach the

largest number of people. However, these magazines are also

consumed primarily by a White, heterosexual audience, and

thus are likely to cater to that audience. Magazines that tar-

get other groups, such as African Americans (e.g., Plous &

Neptune, 1997) or lesbians (e.g., Milillo, 2008), depict

slightly different advertising themes, quite possibly due to

the greater diversity of the models. Additionally, there is

some evidence that these images may impact different kinds

of women differently (e.g., African American women com-

pared to White American women; Jefferson & Stake, 2009),

so the implications of these images may vary depending on

the target audience as well.

Likewise, using the popularity of magazines as our selec-

tion criteria resulted in a selection of men’s magazines that

focused predominantly on sports and health. In fact, with the

exception of Maxim, which is a lifestyle and entertainment

magazine for men, all of the men’s magazines focused on

sports or health. This narrow range of men’s magazines

should be considered when interpreting the findings compar-

ing different magazine types because men’s sports/fitness

magazines may portray women in different ways than other

kinds of men’s magazines. It would be interesting to examine

men’s magazines that do not focus on sports or health. It

would also seem important to consider magazines that are

ostensibly gender-neutral as well, including Time, Newsweek,

and The New Yorker. Because gendered magazines may be

more likely to portray women and men differently than

gender-neutral magazines, it is especially notable that several

of Kilbourne’s claims were not supported with the current

data; therefore, her claims would seem to be even less likely

to be supported in gender-neutral contexts.

Notably, since this research was conducted, a new

version of the Killing Us Softly video series was released,

Killing Us Softly 4 (Media Education Foundation, 2010).

In Killing Us Softly 4, Kilbourne retains many of the same

claims about advertising and indeed uses many of the same

example advertisements as in the third iteration of the doc-

umentary. Thus, we believe these findings are fundamen-

tally relevant to the new version of the film. Interestingly,

a few of the categories we coded have been eliminated from

Kilbourne’s presentation. In the most recent version of the

film, Kilbourne does not mention women being portrayed

in defensive stances, as gold diggers, or as directly mocking

eating disorders. These categories had very low frequencies

in our analyses, and we found no gender differences in the

advertisements’ portrayals of women and men on these

dimensions.

In sum, our research offers strong evidence that magazine

advertisements portray women as flawless and passive and

encourage women to take up less space, particularly in

women’s fashion and men’s magazines. Moreover, it is not

the case that all models are portrayed in this way, but, rather,

women are specifically targeted. Furthermore, not all kinds of

magazines portray women in the same way. Although

women’s home magazines portray women more positively

in some ways, women are portrayed more traditionally in

terms of work roles compared to women’s fashion and men’s

magazines. Efforts should be made to encourage advertisers

to portray women more responsibly. Finally, this research

offers a systematic evaluation of the claims made by Jean Kil-

bourne in her Killing Us Softly video series (Cambridge Doc-

umentary Films, 1979, 1987; Media Education Foundation,

2000, 2010). Several of these hypotheses were supported;

some were not. Thus, our research highlights the importance

of systemically testing popular claims.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Katie Bies and Katie Mullins for their assistance

in coding the data and Mindy Erchull, Miriam Liss, and Abigail

Stewart for their comments on a previous draft of the manuscript.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect

to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, author-

ship, and/or publication of this article.

476 Psychology of Women Quarterly 35(3)

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