Images Boys Girls Offered Today\'s Advertising Media.

¶ … images boys girls offered today's advertising media.

The images of boys and girls as offered by today's advertising media

Even with the fact that boys and girls are born genetically and hormonally different, the information they learn is decisive in influencing them to take on gender roles. Gender is also something that people learn as they grow up, as it does not only involve a person's physical nature. As children develop they are bombarded with information regarding how it would be socially acceptable for them to behave. Devices like the media are influential in this situation as they pressure children in getting a limited definition concerning their role.

The Media Environment

Media devices promoting a simple expression such as "big boys don't cry" can influence some parents in developing less tolerant attitudes toward boys who cry. Some parents might be influenced to believe that it is unnatural for a boy to cry and thus pressure the respective child in thinking that he is putting across deviant behavior. Diverse forms of media focus on providing unrealistic and stereotypical perspectives with regard to gender roles. The fact that children are less experienced in filtering information makes it difficult for them to be able to understand what behavior is right and what behavior is wrong for them. "Young children are especially vulnerable to the teachings of media because they don't have the critical capacity necessary to distinguish between fantasy and reality, to identify persuasive intent, or to understand irony and disregard stereotypes" (Gender Issues In The Media). This influences companies in the media world to take advantage of young children by influencing them to feel like it would only be natural for them to want to behave in a particular way.

Parents need to understand that media are not transparent devices, as they virtually offer a distorted image of the real world. Values and images are commonly devised with the purpose of bringing commercial gains and thus players in the media environment are unhesitant about putting across information that they know might prove to be harmful for some individuals (Gender Issues In The Media).

Male and Female Representation

Women are generally underrepresented in the media and this influences the masses to believe that men are the cultural standard while women are not necessarily important. Moreover, portrayals of the relationship between men and women tend to encourage conventional roles and even promote violence against women. Children's programs often promote images showing groups where girls are outnumbered two to one (Wood 31).

Women and girls are more likely to be represented performing stereotypic chores, as girls are shown playing with baby dolls or cooking toy foods in toy kitchens. Such images influence children to believe that girls need to take on the role of housewives and that it would be unordinary for them to perform tasks that are promoted as being characteristic to men. According to Cardwell and Flanagan (150), "women are usually shown as acting in dependent, unambitious, and emotional ways." Girls who spend more time on media devices are more probable to display stereotypic gender role conceptions than girls who limit their time interacting with media devices. The fact that they are inexperienced makes it difficult for children to be able to distinguish between information that reinforces gender stereotypes and information that encourages children to acknowledge the fact that they are free and that it is not deviant for them to put across attitudes considered to be uncharacteristic for them.

Girls are taught to assume princess-like roles and play games that involve them having to be rescued by a handsome prince. Such ideas actually influence girls to think about a situation where they are saved by prince charming throughout their adolescence. Some girls might actually feel helpless thinking that they will never be able to properly integrate the social order if they are not 'saved'. The media does not only teach girls with regard to the attitudes they need to employ, as they also provide them with a scenario concerning likely outcomes.

Boys are often provided with commercial showing them as GI Joes or as taking on macho attitudes. They are influenced to think that they have to be competitive, independent, and that it would be wrong for them to be emotionally attached to something. "Despite the fact that men have considerably more economic and political power in society than women, these trends - although different from those which affect women and girls - are very damaging to boys" (Gender Issues In The Media).

Media Advertising

The media "play a strong role in defining gender appropriateness through the images they present to young children in commercial enterprises" (Klein 611). Advertising for girls normally involves girls being concerned about their appearance and playing with dolls and jewelry. In contrast, advertising for boys shows them playing sports and being absorbed by games involving war and technology. What is even more concerning is that some commercials become more and more serious as they display gender messages that should only be shown only to adults (Gender Issues In The Media). The majority of advertising voice-overs are male voices and this is meant to emphasize the authority meant to be expressed through these commercials.

Violence in the media and how it shapes gender roles

While media provides girls and boys with the feeling that they are different and that it would be essential for them to adopt particular approaches as they develop, they also induce feelings related to violence. Media devices promoting violence as being perfectly normal influences boys in particular to consider that they need to bully others in order to be considered the men that they expect to become at a certain point in their lives. Being bullied is actually likely to make a boy feel that he is helpless and to influence others in associating him with a girl. "Typically the media messages suggest that boys and men are the aggressors and that girls and women are the victims" (Worell 83).

Effects of media devices on children

Parents practically throw their children in an unknown environment as they provide them with access to media. This means that "too many of them live psychologically unprotected lives, experiencing gender confusion, sexual harassment, unnecessarily early teen pregnancy, loss of intellectual and academic opportunity, and increased psychosocial stress" (Gurian 212). Children practically come to lose understanding of what is normal and they end up associating normality with images promoted by the media world.