Racial and gender biases in magazine advertising - A content-analytic study

Recent evidence suggests that racial and gender biases in magazine advertisements may be increasing. To explore this possibility, a content analysis was performed on 10 years of fashion advertisements drawn from magazines geared toward White women, Black women, or White men(N=1,800 advertisements from 1985-1994). The results indicated that (a) except for Black females in White women's magazines, African Americans were underrepresented in White magazines; (b) female body exposure was greater than male body exposure, and White female body exposure rose significantly during the 10 years; (c) White women were shown in low-status positions nearly twice as often as were other models; and (d) Black women wore the majority of animal prints, most of which were patterned after a predatory animal. These findings suggest that racial and gender biases in magazine advertising persisted, and in some cases increased, between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s.