Effects of Stereotyped Representation in Television on Female and People of Color Viewers’ Self-Esteem

Previous research has indicated a negative correlation between hours spent watching television and viewer self-esteem, particularly for women and people of color. Drawing theoretical support from cultivation theory and research on stereotype threat, this study hypothesizes that this negative relationship is due to negative or stereotyped portrayals of these groups. Seventy-eight undergraduate students at Wesleyan University participated in one of three conditions featuring positive, neutral, or negative representation of women in television. After viewing the television content, participants filled out a measure of self-esteem and also answered open-ended questions about their gender and racial identities. Quantitative results were nonsignificant for self-esteem scores. However, self-esteem means varied by gender, race, and condition in the hypothesized, although not statistically significant, direction. Qualitative evaluation of the responses to open-ended questions revealed several different themes for participant discussion of their gender and racial identities. The frequencies of these themes also varied by gender, race, and condition, although they were not tested for significance. Based on these results, it is likely that the limitations of the study prevented significant self-esteem results. EFFECTS OF STEREOTYPE 2 Effects of Stereotyped Representation in Television on Female and People of Color Viewers’ Self-Esteem Social psychology research has documented for decades that television serves many more purposes than merely entertaining its viewers. Television (TV) programming can function as an escape from painful reality (Greenwood, 2008) or can become the source of more problems, such as when the entertaining activity transitions into an addiction (Greenberg, Lewis, & Dodd, 1999). One of the most robust findings regarding TV’s influence has been its effect on viewer self-esteem. While various studies may dispute the initial point of downturn (e.g. Tin, Ho, Mak, Wan, & Lam, 2012; Martins & Harrison, 2012), nearly all come to the same conclusion: the more TV viewed, especially past the two hour mark, the lower viewer self-esteem. Examining these effects is important for many different pre-adult age groups; younger viewers tend to watch more than any other age group (Roberts, Foehr, Rideout, & Brodie, 1999), while college students are prone to television addiction (Greenberg et al., 1999). Although much research has been done on the effect of the media on body self-esteem of adolescents, especially adolescent girls (e.g. Tiggeman, 2001; Dohnt & Tiggeman, 2006), research is only recently starting to explore the effect of media on global self-esteem and other mental health factors (Hammermeister, Brock, Winterstein & Page, 2005; Martins & Harrison, 2012). Even fewer studies have examined the differences in self-esteem produced by television viewership between different genders and races. There is strong theoretical and research-based evidence that people who watch more television are likely to internalize the views and morals of the television EFFECTS OF STEREOTYPE 3 programs they consume. Children with higher levels of television viewership were more likely to believe gender stereotypes as their viewership of gender stereotyped shows increased (Thompson & Zerbinos, 1997). Women who watch gender stereotype conforming, as compared to gender stereotype breaking, commercials are more likely to conform and less likely to show confidence in public speaking than those shown commercials defying gender stereotypes (Jennings-Walstedt, Geis, & Brown, 1980). Therefore, it is important to understand what exactly television programs are teaching adolescents with regards to how they should view themselves, as they are at a pivotal stage of self-definition. Understanding these messages put forward by the media is especially important when it comes to television representation of race and gender. Although the sheer number of female and people of color characters has increased in recent decades, there is considerable question as to whether the quality of these representations has increased substantially, or even broken away from past gender and racial stereotypes (Eschholz, Bufkin, & Long, 2002). These stereotyped representations of female characters and characters of color could be the reason that television viewing affects its viewers unevenly; the negative effects of TV viewing on White individuals are limited to females; this is not the case for people of color, particularly Black viewers (Martins & Harrison, 2012). While there have been mixed results regarding the impact of increased television viewership on the self-esteem of young Black viewers, there seems to be some support for the idea that increased television viewership leads to a drop in self-esteem, depending on the genre of program (Ward, 2004). Additionally, when compared with White viewers, Black EFFECTS OF STEREOTYPE 4 viewer’s decrease in self-esteem is statistically significant (Martins & Harrison, 2012). This act of comparison is particularly important and often overlooked. While there are studies examining participants of only one race (Cheung & Chan, 1996; Ward, 2004; Rivadeneyre, Ward, & Gordon, 2007), or studies that contain participants of a variety of racial backgrounds without comparing results across groups (Thompson & Zerbinos, 1997), the literature on directly comparing media impacts between races is thin; these types of study are especially limited for races other than Black and White participants. Despite this scarcity, studies that do have group sizes significant enough to test for differences often come away with quite discrete results by racial group (e.g. Martins & Harrison, 2012). Gender is a less frequently ignored differentiating variable than race. In a large number of studies on the effects of television viewership, girls almost exclusively have lower self-esteem with increased media exposure compared to boys. Whether it be body self-esteem (Tiggeman, 2001; Dohnt & Tiggeman, 2006), global self-esteem (Martins & Harrison, 2012), or mental health overall (Hammermeister et al., 2005), girls seem far more susceptible to the harmful elements in television. However, it is unclear what type of media exposure exactly impacts viewers’ self-esteem. Most studies focus solely on volume of television viewed (e.g. Cheung & Chan, 1996; Hammermeister et al., 2005; Martins & Harrison, 2012; Tin, et al., 2012). Studies that have attempted to differentiate between types of content have regularly shown significant differences in effect by group. Some have broken viewership down by genres, such as sports shows, music videos, comedies, dramas in EFFECTS OF STEREOTYPE 5 Ward, (2004), and others have chosen within-genres groupings, such as “chase-andpratfall,” “teachy-preachy”, or “continuing adventure” cartoons as in Thompson & Zerbinos, (1997). However, the diversity among even these categories is still huge, and up to this point, almost no research focuses specifically on the effect of stereotyped representations on viewer self-esteem, and whether it varies by gender or race. There has also been a dearth of studies in which variables were actually manipulated. Across the board, studies have largely focused on filling out questionnaires to determine correlations between TV viewership and self-esteem. Despite the significant weight of evidence indicating that increased TV viewership predicts decreased self-esteem for women and viewers of color, all theorizing thus far must be limited entirely to correlational suggestions. Without a manipulation based experimental design, another possible explanation is merely that more depressed, selfloathing girls are attracted to more television viewership (Hammermeister et al., 2005), or that spending more time watching television deprives girls of other opportunities, such as social interaction or skill building activities that would otherwise raise their self-esteem (Martins & Harrison, 2012). Therefore, the present study will attempt to support causality between viewing stereotyped representation of female characters and the resulting self-esteem of the viewers. Specifically, this study will screen 2 sitcom episodes selected for either stereotyped (negative), nonstereotyped (positive), or neutral (i.e. none; control) representation of women. I hypothesize that participants in the negative condition will have lower self-esteem after the screenings than participants in either other condition, EFFECTS OF STEREOTYPE 6 and that participants in the positive condition will have higher self-esteem afterward than either other condition. I will also be examining as a research questions whether self-esteem changes are affected by the race of the participant. Additionally, participants will be asked to share personal reflections on their gender and racial identity after the screenings. These responses are a more exploratory research venture, and so no hypotheses will be made as to their contents.