GENDERED MEDIA ENGAGINGS AS USER AGENCY MEDIATIONS WITH SOCIOCULTURAL AND MEDIA STRUCTURES: A SENSE-MAKING METHODOLOGY STUDY OF THE SITUATIONALITY OF GENDER DIVERGENCES AND CONVERGENCES. DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of the Ohio State University By CarrieLynn D. Reinhard ***** Ohio State University 2008 Dissertation Committee: Dr. Brenda Dervin, Adviser Approved by Dr. Daniel McDonald Dr. Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick ______________________________ Dr. Jared Gardner Adviser Graduate Program in Communication Copyright by CarrieLynn D. Reinhard 2008 ABSTRACT Across many approaches to media studies, little has been done to understand how the various aspects of men and women's involvement with media products coalesce. Gender is typically assigned to an individual as determined by sexual characteristics or as some rating of socioculturally defined femininity or masculinity as determined by a psychological scale. Gender is then taken to explain why people engage with the media they do, how often, with what type, and to what effect. A narrow focus on gender differences perpetuates a conceptualization of people as always man or woman. Gender is assumed to be a stable trait of a person for predicting such engaging with the media across time and space, and expectations are that someone identified as man or woman would unfailingly act as masculine or feminine, to the potential detriment of the individual who does not. The problem of focusing on gender differences is related to the problem of how people’s engaging with the media has been studied. The process of engaging with a media product is complex, with a variety of material, aka structural, and interpretive, aka agentic, factors interacting that must be studied to understand the process. Often times a single study will focus on one particular aspect of this process, assuming the nature of the others, and in these assumptions gender stereotypes can take root. These stereotypes then reinforce public discourse as to what either gender does with the media surrounding them, reinscribing the creation of certain media products for either gender. These dual problems indicate a need for comprehensive studies to explore the whats, hows and whys of men’s and women's engaging with media products that were either meant for them or for the other gender. The purpose of this study was to understand individuals' experiences with gendered media that was meant for theirs ii and the other gender. Using the dialogic interpretive/performative model of the gendering process as the framework for constructing this research, this study sought to uncover gender commonalities and differences in the gendered media engaging processes of selectings, interpretings, utilizings, and the conditions in which either manifests. Instead of conceptualizing gender as a stable trait, gender was treated as a fluid interpretive state of mind, performed in response to the structural features of situations such as engaging with gendered media products. A series of interviews, using Dervin’s Sense-Making Methodology, were conducted with men and women to explore their experiences with these gendered media. By combining Sense-Making Methodology’s Life-Line and Micro-Element interviewing protocols, men and women recalled four types of experiences with gendered media: media meant for men versus media meant for women; and media used only once versus media used repeatedly. Analysis focused on their selectings, interpretings, and utilizings of these media products, both within specific sense- making instances and across these instances and the four recalled situations. By analyzing gendered media engagings on the level of specific interpretive and performative acts within a situation, more convergence than divergence was noted in how and why men and women engage with gendered media products. Overall, the results of the convergings and divergings across qualitative and quantitative analyses demonstrate a mixture of meeting stereotypical expectations and of resulting from interactions between personal preferences and situational characteristics. For either, how gender is seen and activated as an interpretive stance appears to mediate or moderate which factor is more related to the gendered media engaging during specific aspects of the process. iii DEDICATION To my family, friends and mentors… You are the Elixir for a thirsty Mind. You are the Balm for a stressed Heart. You are the Zephyr for a weary Soul. Shine on, Live long, Prosper always. For as long as the Truth is out there, May your Force never cease To press me towards that possible Dream. iv VITA 2000............................................................B.A. Communication Arts B.A. Psychology University of Wisconsin – Madison, USA 2003-2004……………………………………Graduate Teaching Associate School of Communication The Ohio State University, USA 2005…………………………………………..M.A. Communication The Ohio State University, USA 2004-2006……………………………………Graduate Research Associate IMLS-OCSC-OSU Project School of Communication The Ohio State University, USA 2006 – 2008………………………………….Graduate Teaching Assistant, School of Communication, The Ohio State University, USA PUBLICATIONS Reinhard, C. D. & Dervin, B. (in press). "Media uses and gratifications." In W. F. Eadie (Ed.). 21st Century Communication. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Dervin, B. & Reinhard, C. D. (2007). "How emotional dimensions of situated information seeking relate to user evaluations of help from sources: An exemplar study informed by Sense-Making Methodology." In D. Nahl & D. Bilal (Eds.). Information and Emotion: The Emergent Affective Paradigm in Information Behavior Research and Theory. Information Today, Inc.: Medford, NJ. v Dervin, B. & Reinhard, C. D. (2006). Researchers and practitioners talk about users and each other. Making user and audience studies matter -- paper 1. Information Research, 12 (1), http://informationr.net/ir/12-1/paper286.html. Dervin, B., Reinhard, C. D., & Shen, F. C. (2006). Beyond communication: research as communicating. Making user and audience studies matter -- paper 2. Information Research, 12 (1), http://informationr.net/ir/12-1/paper287.html. Dervin, B., Reinhard C. D., & Kerry, Z. Y. (2006). "The burden of being special: Adding clarity about communicating to researching and serving users, special and otherwise." In D. A. Nitecki & E. G. Abels (Eds). Advances in Librarianship, Vol. 30 (pp. 233-269). Boston: Elsevier/Academic Press. FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: Communication Area of Emphasis: Media Reception Studies vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract......................................................................................................................ii. Dedication..................................................................................................................iv. Vita.............................................................................................................................v. Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………............vii. List of Tables..............................................................................................................ix. List of Figures.............................................................................................................x. Chapters: 1. Introduction and Purpose...............................................................................1. 2. Review of Three Fields..................................................................................23. 3. Methodology and Method………………………………………………………..43. a. Methodology……………………………………………………………43. b. Method………………………………………………………………….50. 4. Results: Selecting Gendered Media Products………………………………...59. 5. Results: Explaining Media Products as Gendered…………………………....83. 6. Results: Reasons for Engaging………………………………………………..104. a. Why Initiated………………………………………………….………104. b. How Volitional………………………………………………………...126. 7. Results: Why Stopped or Continued Engaging………………………………141. 8. Results: How Engaging Helped………………………………………………..161. 9. Results: How Saw Gender……………………………………………………..186. 10. The Sense-Making Instances Across Situations…………………………….214. 11. Conclusions…………………………………………………………………...…228. vii Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………236. Appendix A: Interview Template…………………………………………………….…251. Appendix B: Coding Schemes.………………………………………………………...270. Appendix C: Coding Example……………………………………………………….…293. viii LIST OF TABLES Table Page 2.1 Sample of Encoding Studies, 2002-2008………………………………………30. 2.2 Sample of Decoding Studies, 2002-2008………………………………………34. 2.3 Sample of Recoding Studies, 2002-2008………………………………………37. 3.1 Coding Schemes for Sense-Making Instances………………………………..53. ix LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1.1 Transmission Model of Gendering Process………………………..………..…12. 1.2 Dialogic Model of Gendering Process……………………………………….....14. 3.1 Dervin’s Sense-Making Methodology Triangle Metaphor…………………….48. 4.1 Summary Chart: Gendered Media Products Discussed……………………...75. 5.1 Summary Chart: Why Media Products Gendered…………………………...102. 6.1 Summary Chart: Why Initiated Engaging with Media Product………..…….125. 6.2 Summary Chart: How Volitional Was Engaging with Media Product Seen..…………...138. 7.1 Summary Chart: Why Stopped or Continued Engaging with Media Product………………….…159. 8.1 Summary Chart: How Engaging with Media Product Helped………………184. 9.1 Summary Chart: How Saw Gender when Engaging with Media Product…………………….211. x CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION AND PURPOSE “Sex is