Research objectives and propositions

The main objective of this thesis is to define the similarities and deviations of how women are actually represented in advertising and the media and of how women want to see themselves represented in advertising and the media: the reasons for their attitudes and the implications of these differences on the target group of woman, and on the selection of products and advertising campaigns for the advertising and media sector.

Literature shows that women in advertising and the media are often depicted as mothers, grandmothers, housewives and family idylls. In contrast, they are increasingly represented as sexual objects or decorative accessories with focus on slimness, beauty and youthfulness. Beside this, they are also represented as experts, career women or in a sporty- or leisure time position. In other words, although women are represented in modern-day advertising campaigns as more independent, more self-confident and more emphatica. One can say that women in advertising are still restricted to subordinated, operating, passive, decorating, aesthetic, provocative, young and beautiful roles.³⁵⁴ Unfortunately, this kind of representation in no way corresponds to the actual range of roles, activities, tasks, interests and abilities exerted by women. As roles of women as customers are changing with their entrance and escape of various phases of life, advertising campaigns should mirror their current phase in life. In other words, representation of women in advertising should focus on the totally female nature where women are represented in their daily routine.^{355 356} As a consequence thereof, adequate depictions of reality of women in advertising are important for a positive reaction

354 cf. Holtz-Bacha (2011), p. 104f.

355 cf. Barletta (2006), p. 97

356 cf. Kreienkamp (2007), p. 36

towards advertising campaigns.³⁵⁷ Another main aspect is that women are becoming more and more central with regard to buying decisions due to their increasing occupational situations, among other things, and in line with this, their growing purchasing power.^{358 359} However, in general, women in advertising are less commonly depicted in occupational situations in contrast to men.^{360 361} Besides this, women want to see clear benefits when buying a product. Hence, advertising messages should focus on the various advantages that a certain product has.

Advertising campaigns should not only be entertaining, but also should give sufficient information about the product in order for the customer to be in a position of having a clearer picture. Another essential point is that the perception of female customers does not depend solely on roles women represent in advertisements, but often on how closely the various roles fit to the product.³⁶²

The conceptual part of this thesis already gives a fundamental overview of the problematic of the deviation of how women are represented in advertising and the media and of how women want to see themselves represented in advertising and the media. However, it is necessary to say that opinions with regard to the representation of women in advertising will vary from person to person, from product to product and from segment to segment.³⁶³ As a result of the prevailing complexity of the women´s market, it is therefore not possible to clearly define generally accepted criteria what women want.³⁶⁴ Thus, it is essential to initially define on empirical basis how the participants of the study, which are solely women, perceive and value the actual representation of women in advertising. More concrete, the author of this thesis wants to define spontaneous ideas of the female members when thinking of the representation of women in advertising. Based on theoretical evaluations, women in advertising are often represented in various roles and stereotypes. Thus, this thesis focusses on women´s attitudes with regard to the various roles and stereotypes of women in advertising. As a consequence thereof, it should be possible to answer the research question of how women are actually represented in advertising and the

357 cf. Assig (1993), p. 9ff.

358 cf. Hill (2002), w.p.

359 cf. Barletta (2006), p. 19

360 cf. Bergler (1992), p. 31f.

361 cf. Furnham/Farragher (2000), p. 418ff.

362 cf. Barletta (2006), p. 98

363 cf. Whipple/Courtney (1980), p. 54

364 cf. Jaffé (2005), p. 152

media and what are the reasons for their attitudes. As a brief summary, participants´ opinions about the representation of women in advertising and the media, and possible deviations and / or similarities between the theoretical and empirical findings are shown. In addition to this, reasons why the female interviewees think in a certain way are defined. In a next step, emphasis is placed again on the various roles and stereotypes reviewed in the previous section whereby the main intention is to define if the respondents are in line with the various representations of women in advertising or if changes are desired. The aim is to find out how women like to see themselves in advertising campaigns of being in a position to answer the research question of how women want to see themselves represented in advertising and the media and what their reasons are for their attitudes. As a brief summary, this thesis deals with female´s opinions of how they like to see themselves in advertising, what the reasons are behind it and possible deviations and / or similarities in comparison to conceptual processing. Finally, being able to gain a detailed insight of the situation to define conclusions for the target group of woman and for the advertising industry, it is relevant to define implications of the differences of how women are actually represented in advertising and the media and of how women want to see themselves represented in advertising and the media on the target group of woman, and on the selection of products/advertising campaigns for the advertising and media sector. Thus, the underlying research question is:

“What are the implications of these differences on the target group of woman, and on the selection of products/advertising campaigns for the advertising and media sector?”

Being able to answer the defined research questions, it is necessary to outline various sub-research questions (hypotheses), which are in need to be evaluated:

“Does a portrayal of women in a working role (less traditional role) in advertisements, for example, make the product more desirable, than if women are represented as, say, housewifes or mothers or in a sexual-object - or fashion-object role and what are the reasons for their attitudes?”

“How women perceive the representation of beautiful and slim women in advertising and the media and what are the impacts of such questionable role models on women?”

“How women perceive the representation of women in advertising and the media as sexual objects and what are the impacts of such representations on women?”

“How women perceive the representation of such advertisements like Dove´s campaign and what are the effects of such kind of advertising campaign on women?”

“How women perceive the representation of women in advertising and the media in a humiliating, degrading or even violent way and what are the impacts of such demonstrations on women?”