Female power portrayals in advertising

Abstract

Although stereotypical female portrayals are still common in advertisements, in recent years it appears there has been a move toward portraying women in powerful positions in ads. This research investigates the recent trend in advertising that portrays women in positions of power and offers a typology of female power dimensions in ads. Building on previous literature on social power, feminine power, and current trends in advertising, a typology for female power is proposed and verified using two studies. In the first study, data from a pile sort of current print ads is collected and analyzed by cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling. In the second study, semi-structured interviews are employed to verify the proposed typology. Results verified that receivers perceive female power in advertisements in the following power dimensions: sexual power, expert power, family power, and empowerment (including athletic power).