Gender Representation in TV Advertising for Children: Children’s perceptions and advertising literacy

Abstract

Children are becoming consumers at increasingly younger age and are more influential in consumption decisions within the family. Television still is one of the main ways they are exposed to advertising. Our study, conducted in Portugal, focuses on gender stereotypes on TV advertisements for children and combines a content analysis of advertisements and focus groups with children between 7 and 12 years old. Our findings show that, during a period of 3 months, about 75% of TV advertisements for children contain gender stereotypes. In ad-dition, children are able to recognize such stereotypes, and in general do not identify or agree with the way each gender is portrayed. Finally, children display good levels of advertising literacy, as they are able to recognize the intentions of the brands in the commercials.