gender protrayal1 Cross cultural study of gender portrayal in children ’ s television commercials: Korea and Hong Kong Young Sook Moon Hanyang University & Kara Chan Hong Kong Baptist University

gender protrayal2  Stereotypes in children’s advertising is believed to have potential impact on gender socialization, children’s views of themselves and other people  Gender role portrayal in advertising is well studied in some western countries  cross-cultural variation in gender stereotyping in children advertising was neglected

gender protrayal3  Many multinationals start to view Asian countries as a single regional market:  fast development of communications  more flattening of income, education, opportunity to travel and exposure to other cultures  Asia is really a series of localized markets with their own characteristics  Korea and Hong Kong differ in:  history, culture, language  advertising rules and regulations

gender protrayal4 Gender Socialization  Several theories to account for gender differences:  cultural explanation: established through childhood socialization process  structural explanation: arise from common positions in social structures  social role theory: men and women behave according to the stereotypes associated with social roles they occupy (a more flexible perspective)

gender protrayal5 Hofstede’s typology  Five cultural dimensions:  individualism/collectivism  power distance  uncertainty avoidance  masculinity/femininity  long/short term orientation  This study focuses on the Masculinity/femininity dimension

gender protrayal6 Masculinity Index (MAS) Korea Hong Kong Feminine Masculine

gender protrayal7 Research question  How does the gender portrayal differ in children ’ s commercials in Korea and Hong Kong?  preference for masculine or feminine values in a culture  gender differentiation (whether there is sharp distinction between the roles of men and women)  Method: Content analysis of TVC

gender protrayal8 Hypotheses  H1: Characters in commercials are more likely to be portrayed in relationships with others in Korea (feminine society) than in Hong Kong (masculine society)  H2: Characters are more likely to be portrayed in work situations in Hong Kong than in Korea.  H3: There will be more sex-role differences between male and female characters in Hong Kong than in Korea.

gender protrayal9 Sample  N=345, unduplicated  Korea: commercials of children’s programming from KBS2, MBC and SBS channels  Hong Kong: 40 hours of children’s programming from TVB-Jade and ATV- home channels  Public services announcements, station identification and promotional messages were excluded

gender protrayal10 Two levels of coding  Each commercial, code:  Product category, product user, sex of voice-over, music, presence of central characters, setting and reward type  Each central character (a child, adult, or cartoon human character appears most), up to two CCs, code:  Character type, sex, age, role, employment status, activity, and whether he/she is a spokesperson  coded by two pairs of trained coders, intercoder reliability ranged from 0.8 to 1

gender protrayal11 Table 1. Sample profile (N=345) % Hong Kong (N=147) Korea (N=198) Toys and character toys Education tools and services Medicine and personal goods Others Snack food Drink Fast food Entertainment Chi-square: 32.7; p<0.001 Product category

gender protrayal12 Product user  Korean sample:  12 (6.1%) for male  14 (7.1%) for female  172 (86.9%) for both  Hong Kong sample:  15 (10.2%) for male  6 (4.1%) for female  126 (85.7%) for both  No significant difference

gender protrayal13 Voice over  Korean sample:  82 (41.4%) use male voice(s)  72 (36.4%) use female voice(s)  16 (8.1%) use male and female voices  28 (14.1%) no voice over  Hong Kong sample:  81 (55.1%) use male voice(s)  29 (19.7%) use female voice(s)  9 (6.1%) use male and female voices  28 (19%) no voice over

gender protrayal14 Central characters  Altogether 372 CC coded  Korean sample: 109 male CC (48%), 116 female CC (52%)  Hong Kong sample: 80 male CC (54%), 67 female CC (46%)  No significant difference

gender protrayal15 Relationship  Korean sample: 137 (61%) are in relationship roles, 88 (39%) are in independent roles  Hong Kong sample: 90 (61%) are in relationship roles, 57 (39%) are in independent roles  No significant difference, H1 rejected

gender protrayal16 Employment Status  Korean sample: 18 (8%) are in working roles, 207 (92%) are in non- working roles  Hong Kong sample: 11 (8%) are in working roles, 136 (92%) are in non- working roles  No significant difference, H2 rejected

gender protrayal17 Sex-role difference  Korean sample: no significant difference in the roles, recoded roles, employment and sex of spokesperson, significant difference in the activities of CC  Hong Kong sample: did not show great sex-role difference between male and female CC  H3 rejected

gender protrayal18 Results of hypotheses testing Hypothesis F- stat N.S.No 0.03N.S.No H2: employment status H3: sex role differences H1: relationship Sign. level Supported

gender protrayal19 Discussion  A country’s “gender” failed to predict the gender role portrayals of relationships  Possible explanations:  the standardization of advertising strategy in the Asian Market  heavy use of celebrity endorsement in children’s commercials in Korea  women’s issues and rights are more in concern in today’s Korea  work roles are seldom featured as children are not familiar with work

gender protrayal20 Conclusion & Further Research  Concept of “gender of nations” needs further examination  Application of Hofstede to marketing and advertising research is subject to trial and error  The current study can be repeated for adult’s commercials to see if there is any difference