Women in advertisements are usually only depicted as one body type - tall, thin, 15% below normal weight and often the models weight meets the criteria for anorexia (SOURCE). Through my research I have gained information and different viewpoints on how women have been portrayed in the media over time and how that has affected society. My research includes books, articles, medical studies, and websites that can be spilt into 2 categories- historical content and medical content. While women have been portrayed negatively in every type of media at some point in history I am going to be focusing on how women have been portrayed over time in TV and print advertising and what effect it has on today's community. 

Looking back through history the way women have been portrayed in advertisements has changed. Businessinsider.com shows 18 advertisements that changed the way we think about women over time. The website starts with an advertisement from the 1890s and continues through modern day. The 1890s advertisement displays the woman in the kitchen cleaning floors being a dutiful housewife. During this time period, though, the National American Woman Suffrage Association was formed. The advertisements during the forming of the NAWSA were making sure all women knew that their place was at home and not at the polling place. Moving on from the 1890s the 1900s displayed images of woman fully clothed still constricted to the house. While women were still fighting for their rights, advertisements were making a mockery of it. An example of an advertisement that didn't take women's rights seriously read "Her Declaration of Independence" referring to a new kitchen appliance that cut down on the work women had to do therefore women received more independence to do more work in the kitchen. The 1920s advertisements suggested that women were afraid to go out and leave the house as one advertisement read "The woman who never went out" and showed a woman in the kitchen. Skipping ahead to the 1950s, women started taking a more active role in advertisements and were shown leaving the home scenery. But more often than not advertisements still portrayed the fact that it was a man's world. The 1960s marked the beginning of advertisements that targeted women. Examples would be dieting programs and cigarette for women campaigns. 

The 1990s was an era of hyper-sexualized women in advertisements. A popular Sony advertisement shows a girl sitting on a table holding a Walkman and the text reads, "You know you want it". Another popular advertisement during the 1990s was the 1994 Hello Boys Wonderbra advertisement, which displays the stereotypical woman shown in undergarments. The year 2004 brought a backlash or a start to a backlash of the ultrathin and sexual portrayal of women in advertisements with the release of Dove's real women, real shapes campaign. This continued with Nike's advertisement with the "I Love my Butt" advertisement that pictured a real woman not altered to be shown skinnier stating that she loved her butt (Felix, Samantha). Overall the source buissnessinsider.com is full of great examples of how women have changed through history by giving actual examples of advertisements through time. 

Another source, which gave great examples of advertisements through history and described in detail about the change in women's role in advertisement was a book titled Mass Media and Society. According to the book, advertisements in the 1970s showed that women could do it all. They depicted a "superwoman" that could juggle household chores and having a career and succeeding at both. The book also states that this "superwoman" picture was false in most cases when in actuality women during the 1970s were struggling with conflicts between the household chores and their career just like buissnessinsider.com mentioned. As soap operas took a rise in the 1980s advertisements followed the trend of depicting women as scheming, manipulative, and submissive to men. Advertisements for power suits became popular and the women were finally being able to juggle career and household chores successfully. Advertisements also started to feature a strong matriarch as family head rather than a patriarch in the 1980s. 

Not only was Mass Media and Society a great source to use to get information about the history of advertisements it also talked about four common myths that advertisements try to use. The first myth is the common phrase "Blondes have more fun". The advertisements try to sell the American blonde women and show how much fun blondes have. Another myth that advertisements use when selling products is that "thin is in". This concept is shown all over the place whether it's a super unrealistic skinny model or advertisements for dieting plans, diet sodas, and diet books. The third myth is that women do not age. This myth is often associated with skin care products that can make you look younger and control sings of aging. The last and probably most common myth is that sex sells. Often times sex distracts the audience (Wells, Alan). 

Another source, which also deals with the history of advertisement, is a book titled Stereotypes Galore! Women's Emancipation as Reflected in Advertising. This source makes a very good point stating that advertisements reflect society's values. The source gives an example of the 1950s when during that time cosmetic products and fashion items were popular which was shown in the advertisements people saw. Because these products were made mainly for women, women were the ones targeted in the advertisements. The source, just like buissnessinsider.com, mentions that women were no longer pictured in the home as they were before. But just as women were depicted away from the home, they were also seen as the problem. A popular hygiene item used this depiction in their 1950 advertisement. The advertisement shows a woman with a shameful expression and the caption under the picture reads "Failure to practice hygiene often results in such needless tragedies- homes broken up, few social invitations, the feeling of being shunned without knowing why." The advertisement goes on to promise solving all of women's problems (Biermann, Gesa). The book Stereotypes Galore! Women's Emancipation as Reflected in Advertising is a great addition to my research because it gives another example and insight into how women were portrayed in advertisements. 

The source Advertising & Popular Culture: Studies in Variety and Versatility talks about sexual content in advertising. The book states that women are shown in advertising in a decorative, nonactive role. It also talked about how TV advertisements that depict sexual scenes are usually larger than any other advertisement and are the predominate advertisement shown on television. This source also went in depth about how women in television advertisements are shown with more exaggerated acting and stereotypical voice tones and body language. This source helps my research paper because it gives a different viewpoint of women in advertisement through the lens of television (Danna, Sammy R). 

There are several problems that the community faces with how women are portrayed in advertisements. And one of my sources goes in depth about the problems. The book Women, Feminism, and Media, states that viewing women as objects starts at a young age when they see the advertisements. According to a study done in 1979, children exposed to such stereotypes tend to have a more restricted view of appropriate sex roles than those that are exposed to counter-stereotypical representations. The solution to this problem would be to eliminate gender-based stereotyping and put more women in roles of power in the community. The book goes onto say that few women actually hold positions of power in media companies so the images that the media companies display often distorts a women's status in the social world and the media doesn't present women who are viable role models. Because media's so called "role models" prevent and impede female accomplishments it encourages men to define women as sex objects or as a homemaker (Thornham, Sue). 

Another problem the community faces with the way women are portrayed in advertisements is eating disorders. A study found that 47% of girls wanted to lose weight after looking at thin models in advertisements but only 29% of those girls were overweight. According to healthyplace.com 75% of women think they are overweight and 90% of those women are overestimating their body sizes. Researchers have found that advertisements that depict thin models don't have long-term negative effects on adolescent women but the advertisements do have an effect on the adolescents that are already struggling with their body image ("Eating Disorders: Body Image and Advertising."). 

Another source I found that deals with the medical side of women in advertisements is an article titled "Body Dissatisfaction: Can a Short Media Literacy Message Reduce Negative Media Exposure Effects amongst Adolescent Girls?" This source was about how young adolescent girls were broken into two groups and one group was shown unnaturally thin models in today's advertisements while the other group was shown the same pictures but also watched a short video of the evolution of models. The girls in the study then ranked their self-esteem after both watching the video and seeing the pictures or after just seeing the pictures. The results showed that the girls that saw the evolution video had a higher self esteem than after the experiment than the girls that just saw countless skinny models and not the evolution video. The results of the experiment showed that a way to reverse the effect of the media's unhealthy skinny models is a short video of average models such as the models used in the evolution video. This brief easily accessible movie would help promote media literacy and encourage girls to not change themselves just because of the models shown in society today (Halliwell, Emma, Alice Easun, and Diana Harcourt). 

The last source I found which dealt with the medical side of my research was a documentary entitled False Advertising: Media and Beauty. This documentary interviewed women about how they felt about the way women are portrayed in advertisements. All of the women gave answers dealing with the fact today nobody can look like the models in the advertisements because they are all digitally remastered and they were confused on to what they were suppose to look like since advertisements display false images (False Advertising: Media and Beauty). Hearing from real women about their feelings on advertisements was probably my favorite part about doing all this research. It gave me opinions and viewpoints that were real and genuine from women just like myself. 

Overall my research explains in depth about the history behind advertisement and how they displayed women. The books, articles, medical journals, and documentary that I found pertaining to my topic also discussed the effects that advertisements negatively portraying women have on society and what needs to be done in the future.
