We examined a total of 61 ads. Here are our findings.
click to enlarge*Example of "Gender not specified" is an ad that feature non-gender specific animals
In analyzing the the ads for Super Bowl XLIV, we noticed a few ways in which sexism may be present. One of the ways is shown in the pie chart above. For a show that has a large female audience (almost half of the viewers were women), the ads were surprisingly lacking in women. Super Bowl 2010 was watched by 48.5 million women, an increase of 17% compared to last year and yet advertisers didn't think it was very important to have women in their ads. This is illustrated by the 1st pie chart which shows that 31% of the Super Bowl ads shown featured only men. When this is compared to 5% of the ads that featured only women, the difference is obvious.
click to enlargeCategory A: Ads where women spoke ≥50% of the dialogue
Category B: Ads where women spoke less than 50% of the dialogue
Category C: Ads where women didn't speak at all
For the ads that had dialogue and featured both women and men, we examined the percentage of dialogue spoken by women in relation to the overall length of dialogue. In this area, there was also a surprisingly large number of ads where women spoke little dialogue or didn't speak at all. In other words although women showed up in the ads, they didn't really speak much if they spoke at all.
click to enlargeIn this part of the analysis we found that the majority of the ads didn't portray overtly stereotypical gender roles. One possible reason for this is if the ad's focus isn't on relationships between men and women. However, a troubling percentage of the ads did show stereotypical gender roles. In THIS POST, there are explanations on how we found the ads we examined sexist.
In summary, Super Bowl 2010's ads were problematic in many ways. A significant number of ads didn't have women in them and if they did they rarely played significant roles. In ads where women were present, they were rarely given a lot of dialogue. Also, a big percentage of ads portrayed stereotypical gender roles.
In summary, Super Bowl 2010's ads were problematic in many ways. A significant number of ads didn't have women in them and if they did they rarely played significant roles. In ads where women were present, they were rarely given a lot of dialogue. Also, a big percentage of ads portrayed stereotypical gender roles.
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