Equality in Advertising

A Scale for Sexism

by Suzanne Pingree, Robert Parker Hawkins, Matilda Butler, and
William Paisley

A majority of ads portraying women

selected from Playboy, Time, Newsweek, and Ms.
puts them down or keeps them in their place.

Research on media sexism has usually relied on nominal categories that count
what images, how often, and when and where they occur (e.g., 5 , 6 , 7, 8, 10, 11,
12, 13, 15). A content analysis based on an ordinal set of categories that could
tell us how much sexism is in any given presentation would permit more
meaningful, refined research in the future. Instead of pointing toward quan-
titative indicators of sexism such as very small numbers of women, we need to
be able to outline qualitative indicators of sexism. Increasing the representation
of women in the media (a quantitative approach) will probably not reduce
media sexism unless the manner in which women are presented also changes (a
qualitative approach).
A qualitative analysis of media sexism requires that we define what we mean
by sexism and specify a dimension underlying a continuum of very sexist to non-
sexist portrayals of women. Butler-Paisley and Paisley-Butler (3) have described
an ordinal consciousness scale that concentrates on how women as presented in

Suzanne Pingree is a Lecturer in Womens Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison,

where Robert Parker Hawkins is an Assistant Professor at the Mass Communication Research
Center Matilda Butler is a Lecturer and Research Associate and William Paisley is an Associate
Professor at the Institute for Communication Research, Communication Department, Stanford
University Each of the authors is married to one of the others
The authors wish to thank the following University of Wisconsin students who worked on the
study and served as coders: Jane Clare Allen, Mitchel David Benson, Richard Warren Cameron,
Mark Francis Campanile, Dipankar R Dasgupta, Mary Margaret Dergin. Catherine Curtis Feiers-
tein, Andrew James Garratt, Reid Harrie Gearhart, Ann Kathryn Heimstreet, Patricia Ann Hoopes.
Max Joseph Hosmanek. Jeffrey Michael Hudis, Gary Donald Kalscheur, Kay N Kreutzman, Karen
Kay Kuhl, Lenell Mills, Thomas Steven Rutchik, and Andrew James Weber

193
Journal of Communication, Autumn 1976

Level V Freedom from all stereotypes

[Women and men
as individuals

Level IV

must be equals

Woman may be a professional,

but first place i s home

I
,
Womans place is in the home
or in womanly occupations

Level I
r 1
Woman is a two-dimensional,
nonthinking decoration
Limited by stereotypes

Figure 1: A consciousness scale for media sexism: women

the media are limited to special roles and relationships (see Figure 1). Level I
can be characterized as put her down. Presentations of women at this level in-
clude the dumb blond, the sex object, and the whimpering victim. The woman
is portrayed as being less than a person, a two-dimensional image. Examples of
such images are common in mens magazines such as Playboy, in advertisements
where the womans body is included as a decorative object, and in situation
comedies where the woman relies on others to do her thinking for her.
Consciousness Level II is found in all forms of media. It can be characterized
as keep her in her place. Traditional strengths and capacities of women are
acknowledged, but tradition also dictates womanly roles. Women are shown
functioning well as wives, mothers, secretaries, clerks, teachers, and nurses.
Negative Level 11 images show women struggling with roles that are beyond
them (business executives, doctors, editors, etc. ) or in which they develop
unwomanly traits.
Consciousness Level 111 represents the consciousness level of many pro-
gressive media images of women: give her two places. In entertainment
(e.g., television drama), the woman can be a lawyer or architect as long as she
has dinner on the table for her husband at six. In reportage, the woman
executive is described as grandmotherly, and the interview eventually turns to
her favorite recipes. It is the career that is often viewed as the something
extra. Housework and mothering come first. The image is that women may

194
 Equality in AdvertisinglA Scale f o r Sexism

sometimes work outside the home professionally, but always work in the home.
It is possible to find these images in the media, although they are far less
frequent than Level I and II images of women. One example of this portrayal is
the ad with the woman Ph.D. in biochemistry discussing what she gives her
children for breakfast.
Level IV, acknowledge that she is fully equal, is rare among media images
of women. Dewars whiskey ads are good examples of Level IV portrayals. For
instance, the profile of Eve Queler, conductor, treats her as a professional. There
is no mention of her private life, her favorite recipes, or how she cleans the
house. The important distinction between this level and Level 111 that also
allows women to be professionals, is that Level IV images do not remind us that
housework and mothering are non-negotiably the womans work as well.
Topping the consciousness scale, Level V is nonstereotypic. Individual
women and men are viewed as superior to each other in some respects, inferior
in other respects. The dogmatism of Level IV (women shall be equal to men) is
unnecessary, because individuals are not judged by their sex. Level V is men-
tioned because the consciousness scale logically requires it, not because Level V
images can be found easily in the media.

As one moves up the levels of the consciousness scale,

womans opportunities continually increase.

A Level I woman is so limited and/or incompetent that she is not a complete

person; a Level II woman is competent, but only within a circumscribed sphere
of activity; a Level III woman is allowed a broader sphere, but only if traditional
activities remain primary; Level IV allows still more freedom by saying that
woman is and must be equal to man; and Level V asserts that each individual
should be treated non-stereotypically and that women and men can and some-
times do excel each other.
Thus, instead of simply characterizing some images as sexist and others as
non-sexist, the levels of consciousness scale provide the beginning of an ex-
plication of media sexism by dividing media portrayals of women into five
conceptually-derived categories that can be placed in ordinal relationships with
one another.
It remains, however, to test the validity and usefulness of the scale as a tool
for the analysis of mass media content. To be useful, the scale should be easy to
apply and should produce reliable distinctions in coding. The validity of the
scale is much more difficult to assess, given the lack of other accepted measures
of media sexism with which to compare it, but results obtained using the scale
should correspond closely to our intuitive expectations about the mass media
and should not conflict with assumptions contained in the scale itself.
The consciousness scale was applied to advertising portrayals of women
found in four major national magazines: Ms., Time, Newsweek, and Playboy.
If our institutions and popular folklore about these magazines portrayals of
women are correct, a n d if the scale is a valid way of tapping sexism in the media,
then M S . should have relatively more high-level advertisements than the other

195
Journal of Communication, Autumn 1976

magazines and Playboy relatively more low-level ads, with Time and Newsweek
(mainstream magazines) falling in between. Furthermore, since Level I1
(keep her in her place) is conceptualized as the status q u o for women in our
society, there should be a heavy concentration at this level, especially for Time
and Newsweek.
Ten advertisements containing a picture of a woman and covering at least
1/6 of a magazine page were randomly selected from each issue of the four
magazines from the period July 1973 to June 1974. Since Time and Newsweek
are weekly-issued magazines, all the issues in a month were treated as one large
issue for the random selection process. Eleven randomly paired two-person
groups, most composed of one woman a n d one man, were assigned approxi-
mately 50 advertisements across all four magazines to code. Coders were mem-
bers of a n introductory journalism course who had spent several class sessions
discussing the consciousness scale. Each coder independently assigned a level
to each ad, and then compared her/his judgment with the other member of
the team. Disagreements were noted and referred to a committee which made
the final decision.
In general, the above descriptions of the different levels of consciousness
were sufficiently detailed for coding purposes. It was necessary, however, to
make three further decisions about the level to be coded for certain kinds of
advertisements. First, all ads that showed a woman with no real function
involving the product were coded as Level I. For instance, a woman standing
next to a car would be coded Level I, while a woman demonstrating how a new
liquid makeup looks would be coded Level I I because this is a traditional
womanly activity. If the womans face and figure are used only to enhance
the attractiveness of the product and could not reasonably b e said to give us
more information about the product, then the woman is being used to decorate.
Second, a large number of ads in all the magazines we coded had both a
woman and a man in a romantic situation. There are many different levels of the
scale that such ads could be assigned to: they could be Level IV on the basis that
the two lovers are equally in love, neither is superior; they could be Level I
because of the undertone of sexuality in many romantic relationships. If we had
been dealing with another medium, it would have been possible to code each
romantic situation individually because we would have been able to see just
what kind of relationship we were dealing with. Magazine advertisements
present still pictures of life; one can gain n o information from the picture about
past or future relationships. Instead of having each coder use her/his own
perceptions in coding romantic situations, we decided that romance is a very
appropriate status quo setting for a woman, and thus belongs to Level 11, keep
her in her place, consciousness.

The lack of a historical context for pictures

created dificulties with coding any ad as.Leve1 V.

T h e nature of the level almost requires that we know something more about
the woman than a single picture can present. W e need a series of events
showing the woman is good at some things, bad at others, a n d that neither of

196
 Equality in AdvertisinglA Scale for Sexism

these things is sex-linked. For example, Level V allows a man to be superior to a

woman in some activities, but in one frame we cannot differentiate between this
superiority as non-stereotypic Level V or as very stereotypic Level 11. However,
any presentation of a woman that shows her superior in a context other than the
home or traditional womanly activity must be a Level V: the top of the scale
is the only place where a woman is allowed to be superior. Thus, unless there
was some text with the advertisement that indicated Level V, superior men were
not coded V while superior women were. This decision meant that some
potential Level V ads may have been coded Level 11, but this is appropriate
since the image of the superior man fits very well with the traditional view of the
woman-man relationship of Level II.
Once these decisions were made, the consciousness scale proved to be quite
easy to apply and produced clear distinctions in coding. Coder judgments were
extremely reliable. Across all coders, there were only 15 advertisements from a
total of 447 for which there were reported disagreements. This result suggests
that the scale is clear-cut and reliable for objectifying amounts of media sexism.
Results of a cross-tabulation of consciousness level by magazine are pres-
ented in Table 1. As predicted, Playboy had significantly more Level I ads than
any other magazine (x2 = 32.40, Idf, p > .OOl), while Ms. had more Level IV
and V ads (x2 = 16.56, ldf, p > .OOl). Further, Time and Newsweek were
similar to each other and had more Level 11 ads than Ms. and Playboy (x2 =
4.40, Idf, p > .05). Finally, consonant with our original expectations, the most
frequent kind of ad was a Level 11 status q u o ad, comprising 48 percent of all
ads, with Level I ads pulling in second place with 27 percent.

Although the primary purpose of this study was to test

the usefulness of the levels of consciousness scale, it also
served to objectify and detail what were previously just
intuitions about the characteristics of these four magazines.

Over half (54 percent) of Playboys ads portrayed women as decorations or

sex objects; only 12 percent showed women participating in the mans world
(Levels 111, IV, and V). And while Time and Newsweek used women as
decoration far less often than Playboy (and, in fact, no more often than M s . ) ,

Table 1: levels of consciousness of advertisements in four magazines

Level of Playboy Time Newsweek MS. % of

consciousness % % % % total

I 54 18 18 16 27
II 34 55 60 40 48
Ill 1 7 5 3 4
IV 10 20 16 37 19
V 1 1 2 3 2
(N) (120) (120) (120) (871 (447)
If we had been able to secure enough ads from M s . , the total number of ads would have been
480. However, in many issues of Ms.we could not find 10 ads showing a woman. Thus, we have 120
ads from each of the other magazines, but 87 from MS.

197
Journal of Communication, Autumn 1976

more than half the ads in these two magazines (55 percent a n d 60 percent
respectively) placed women in their traditional roles of wife and mother,
womens work, and romantic interest.
M s . , of course, far surpasses the other three magazines in presenting women
as the equals of men and full participants in the world of work. But even in M s . ,
56 percent of all ads show women at the two lowest positions on the con-
sciousness scale. This result draws into focus the meaning of the scale: it is not
the mere presence of a Level I or Level I I ad that constitutes sexism; rather, it is
the preponderance of images of women in certain prescribed and subordinate
roles that constitutes sexism. Certainly, it is not sexist to show a woman as a
competent housewife and mother. It is sexist to always show women this way.
And t h e content analysis performed here provides ample evidence of such
sexism, even in advertisements of one magazine supposedly catering to a
liberated audience.
Many people may find our analysis of sexism in the media arguable. On the
surface, it seems very reasonable that most women are shown in the Level I1
housewife role. After all, the media are just reflecting reality. But are they? In
reality, 40 percent of t h e workforce is female, and nearly all women have
worked at some point in their lives. While Level 11 does allow a woman to work
in a womanly occupation, most of the Level I I ads coded did not show
women in that context. The media as represented by the four magazines we
coded do limit women and stereotypically distort reality to produce this limita-
tion.

I t is also reasonable to question the importance of media

sexism, now that w e have begun to document its existence.

Does it really matter that womens options are limited in the media when we
can see more diversity for women in our own experiences? W e believe that it
does matter, that the information that helps us build our expectations about
women and men, our images in Bouldings sense (2), is greatly contributed to
by the media. T h e media constantly provide us with symbolic messages about
our cultural environment, the status of the world, and the relative importance of
women and men (9). When media portrayals of women are uniformly degrading
or limiting, the audiences images of women are likely to b e similarly con-
strained. We have some fairly direct evidence to support this position (1,4), and
inferential evidence from research on other media effects (14). If women and
men are to b e freed from artificial constraints on their abilities and opportu-
nities, we must stop teaching each other a n d our children that these constraints
are legitimate.
In the course of this study, it became painfully clear that media images of
men are also restricted. A complementary consciousness scale for men might
have five levels (see Figure 2). Level I is similar to Level I for women. Men
decorate advertisements for products that do not require the presence of a
handsome, sexy, well-dressed man t o provide more information about the
product. O n e can also conceive of a male sex object, as in Charles Atlas ads.

198
 Equality in Advertising1 A Scale for Sexism

Level V
Women and men
as individuals

Level IV

Level Ill Level IIi

IWoman may be a professional,

but first dace is home I Man may help out competently at
home, but first place is work

Level II Level I1
Mans place is at work or
or in womanly occupations at manly activities at home

Level I Level I
Man is a two-dimensional decoration
nonthinking decoration

Figure 2: A consciousness scale for media sexism: women and men

Level 11 is the world of work and traditional manly activities. Men are shown
in business or sports contexts and, if they are shown working around the home,
it is mowing the lawn or taking the garbage out. Level I1 men who attempt
traditional womanly activities at home such as changing diapers, cooking, or
doing the wash, are abysmally incompetent. The combined responsibility of
work and home for Level 111 women is similar for Level 111 men. However, the
priorities are reversed. Men are competent in both worlds, but they are helping
out at home. Their true place is outside the home at work. Levels IV and V are
necessarily identical to Levels IV and V of the consciousness scale for women.
Further research in the area of sexist content, using both sides of the
consciousness scale, should begin to document how thoroughly the potential
roles and activities of both sexes are circumscribed in the media. This research
naturally leads toward developing the link between media images of sex-
appropriate activity, as has been done for television violence and aggressive
behavior (14). Once documented, the presence of sexism in the media and its
subsequent effects on the developing minds of our children as well as on our
own images of the sexes can be attacked more forcefully.

REFERENCES
1 . Beuf, A. Doctor, Lawyer, Household Drudge. Journal of Communication 24, 1974, pp,
142-145.
Journal of Communication, Autumn 1976

2. Boulding, K . E. The Image: Knowledge in Life and Society. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of
Michigan Press, 1956.
3. Butler-Paisley. M. and W. J. Paisley-Butler. Sexism in the Media: Frameworks for Research.
Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism, San
Diego, August 1974.
4. Cheles-Miller, P. An Investigation of Whether the Stereotypes of Husbands and Wives
Presented in Television Commercials Can Influence a Childs Perception of the Role of
Husband and Wife. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Communi-
cation Association, New Orleans, April 1974.
5. Chulay, C. and S. B. Francis. The Image of the Female Child on Saturday Morning TV
Commercials. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Communication
Association, New Orleans, April 1974.
6 . Courtney, A . E. and T. W. Whipple. Women in TV Commercials. Journal of communication
24. 1974, pp.
.. 110-118.
7. Downing. M . Heroine of the Daytime Serial. Journal of Communication 24, 1974, pp,
130- 137.
8. Franzwa. H . H. Working Women in Fact and Fiction. Journal of Communication 24, 1974,
pp. 104-109.
9. Gerbner, G. Communication and Social Environment. Scientific .4merican, September 1972.
10. Long, M . L. and R.J. Simon. The Roles and Status of Women on Childrens and Family TV
Programs. Journalism Quarterly 51, 1974, pp. 107-110.
11. National Organization for Women. Women in the Wasteland Fight Back: A Report on the
Image of Women Portrayed in TV Programming. NOW F.C.C. Task Force, 1972.
12. Sternglanz, S. H. and L. A. Serbin. Sex Role Stereotyping in Childrens TV Programs.
Developmental Psychology 10, 1974, pp. 710-715.
13. Streicher, H. W. The Girls in the Cartoons.Journal of Communication 24. 1974, pp. 125-129.
14. Surgeon Generals Scientific Advisory Committee on Television and Social Behavior. Television
and Growing Up: The Impact of Televised Violence. Washington, D . C . : U.S. Government
Printing Office, 1972.
15. Tedesco, N . Patterns in Prime Time. ,\ournal of Communication 24, 1974, pp. 119-124.

Balanced Portrayal of Sexes In Radio

Is Subject of Interpretive Statement
The following resolution was adopted by the Radio Code Board at its
March 21 meeting in Chicago:
Radio advertisers and broadcasters should include among their public
interest responsibilities a consistent effort to convey to listeners an
awareness that all individuals deserve recognition of their innate dignity
as human beings.
A stepped-up and sustained endeavor in these regards is urged to
promote among all persons, separately and towards one another, a
sense of each individuals worth, self-pride and dignity.
In addition to a fair reflection of these concepts by radio broadcasters
in their over-all programming fare, radio advertisers also are enjoined to
be appropriately sensitive to the considerations involved so as to achieve
in promotions for products or services a balanced portrayal of human-
kind in all aspects of society.

200
 Texts that practice
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