THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE LEVEL OF INFORMATIVE CONTENT AND THE LEVEL OF SEX-ROLE STEREOTYPIC CONTENT IN TV ADVERTISEMENT

Jae-Yung Cho; Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, Graduate School Hanyang University

June, 1986

1. Problems and hypotheses

The most obvious function of advertisement is to provide information for consumer decision making. The informative content in advertisement has been analyzed by many researchers (Resnick & Stern, 1977;Laczniak,1979; Reid & Rotfeld, 1981; Healey. & Kassarjian, 1983). All the researchers analyzed TV and magazine advertisements on the basis of 14 evaluative criteria (informational cues) which were made by Resnick & Stern. According to them, informative advertisement should provide at least one informational cue. The more informational cue provided, the more informative. Advertisements which did not provide at least one informational cue were considered non-informative.

Providing information is the most obvious function of advertisement. However, many messages other than information are provided through the visual and auditory stimuli of the TV advertisement. The character and voice-over images presented within TV advertisement have been analyzed by numerous researchers (Dominick & Rauch, 1972; Courtney & Whipple, 1974, 1980;Verna, 1975; Gulley & Bennett, 1976; O'Donnell & O'Donnell, 1978; Scheibe, 1979). They have documented the existence of sex-role stereotypic portrayal of females in TV advertisement.

The above researches come into some problems. First, in case of the analyses of informative content, they were based on only quantity of information without evaluating quality of information. Second, in case of the analyses of sex-role stereotypic portrayal, they were mainly relied on finding frequency in various criteria. However, though such researches can show the existence of sex-role stereotypic portrayal in TV advertisement as a whole, they can't show clearly that in each TV advertisement. Therefore, qualitative research is needed. Finally, it is necessary to study the relationship between the informative content and the sex-role stereotypic content. The two dimensions exist together in advertisement and the results of Resnick & Stern (1977), Gulley & Bennett (1976)'s researches imply there would be the relationship.

On the basis of above problems, this study hypothesized that:

(1) There is a significant relationship between the level of informative content and the level of sex-role stereotypic content in TV advertisement.

(2) The level of informative content is different in each product category.

(3) The level of sex-role stereotypic content is different in each product category.

(4) The frequency of female characters having major role is more than that of male characters.

(5) Female characters having major role appear in home settings more than in outdoor settings.

(6) The frequency of male voice-overs having major role is more than that of female voice-overs.

2. Conceptualizations

(1) Informative content in advertisement

Information in advertisement is the message that makes a viewer(consumer) buy a product intelligently after seeing an advertisement than before seeing it. In order for an advertisement to be considered informative, it must satisfy both the quantity and the quality of information. Because informative advertisement must permit consumer to make a good buying decision and to be a good user. Assessment of the quality of information contained in an advertisement is based on an analysis of the misleading or factual content of the information provided. Swagler(1975) proposed the five point scale (misleading, puffing-misleading, puffing, informative-puffing, informative) for judging the informative content of advertisement. The scale was based on assessment of both the quantity and quality of information.

(2) Sex-role stereotypic content in advertisement

Stereotypes are defined as "those folk beliefs about the attributes characterizing a social category on which there is substantial agreement. According to many psychologists including Freud, stereotypic characteristics of female are "passive, sentimental, dependent, weak and sensitive"; stereotypic characteristics of male are "active, reasonable, independent, strong and insensitive". Recognizing such characteristics, Parsons (1942) and Head (1949) maintained that female should participate in child care and household work in home and male in outdoor work. Therefore, sex-role stereotype is defined as a belief that trends to determine person's role on the basis upon the stereotypic characteristics of female and male.

The existence of sex-role stereotypic portrayal in advertisement has been documented by numerous researchers. Pingree et al. (1975) developed a scale for measuring sexism in advertisement. The scale is composed of five levels (Level I~V) and relies on a qualitative rather than a simple quantitative analysis(measuring frequency) of media sexism.

3. Methods

(1) Collection of advertisement sample: The 120 advertisements were videotaped from MBC-TV between 5:30 p.m. and 12:30 p.m., November, 1985.

(2) Rating scale (for Hypothesis 1,2,3,): Swagler's five point scale was used for rating the level of informative content. For rating the level of sex-role stereotypic content, Pingree et al's five point scale was developed on the basis of the trends reported in the earlier studies (non-stereotypic, sex-role stereotypic I, II, III, sex-objectified).

(3) Categories of analysis (for Hypothesis 4, 5, 6): Character(major role, supporting role), voice-over(major role, supporting role), setting and consumer's sex oriented by advertisement.

(4) Rater reliability: Four students were selected as raters. Two each were randomly assigned to rate either informative content or sex-role stereotypic content. Inter-rater reliability was .87 (Pi) for informative content and .93 (Pi) for sex-role stereotypic content.

(5) Statistical test: Pearson's γ, F-test and Chi square test.

4. Results

There was an inverse relationship between the level of informative content and the level of sex-role stereotypic content in TV advertisement. The level of informative content and the level of sex-role stereotypic content associated with each product category. The frequency of female characters having major role was more than that of male characters and female characters having major role appeared in home settings more than in outdoor settings. The frequency of male voice-overs having major-role was more than that of female voice-overs.