Index of Paper Presentations for the Parallel Sessions - Academy of ...

markets as a form of sexual appeal (Reid & Soley, 1983). Women portrayed in decorative roles usuallyare shown seeking beauty and physical attractiveness and as sex objects, even when sex is unrelated to theadvertised product (Plakoyiannaki & Zotos, 2009). In and roles depicting women as equal to men, womenare not shown in any female role stereotypes. They are portrayed as equal to men mainly in order toappeal to the different segments of readers that include both women and men (Lyonski, 1985).Previous research. Researchers in the social sciences and communication fields have studied theportrayal of women in the media for a long time (e.g., Courtney & Lockeretz, 1971; Hovland, et al.,2005). Although almost all of this research has been undertaken in the US and other highly industrializedWestern countries, some studies have been conducted in emerging market countries or across cultures(e.g., Cho, Kwon, Gentry, Jun, & Kropp, 1999). Here, we review some important prior studies regardinggender portrayals in advertising.Previous research on gender role stereotyping in advertising has produced inconsistent results.While some studies have reported the presence and increasing incidence of gender bias (e.g., Belkaoui &Belkaoui, 1976; Sexton & Haberman, 1974), other studies have reported the presence of gender bias butfound it to be decreasing (e.g., Allan & Coltrane, 1996). Most studies, however, find that womengenerally are not portrayed favorably and that they tend to be portrayed in narrowly defined traditionalroles (e.g., Belkaoui & Belkaoui, 1976; Courtney & Lockeretz, 1971). When women are featured inadvertisements, they typically are not portrayed as decision makers in the context of important matters(Maake, 2006).In addition to the identity cues associated with the message source, non-source cues (e.g., setting orlocation, background, language or text) may contribute to the persuasive potential of an advertisingmessage (Brumbaugh, 2002). Several studies have found that females and males tend to be used toadvertise different types of products (Bretl & Cantor, 1988) and likely to be confined to certain settings orlocations (Welter, 1966). Women are also more likely to be portrayed in family scenes and as providersof service to others (Maake, 2006). Power relations may also be revealed by narration and voices, for