The History of Gender Representations in Teen Television
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The History of Gender Representations in Teen Television Author: Nicole Sandonato Persistent link: http://hdl.handle.net/2345/3869 This work is posted on eScholarship@BC, Boston College University Libraries. Boston College Electronic Thesis or Dissertation, 2014 Copyright is held by the author, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise noted. The History of Gender Representations in Teen Television By Nicole Sandonato A Senior Honors Thesis Submitted to the Department of Communication Boston College May 2014 The History of Gender Representations in Teen Television Sandonato i Acknowledgements First, I wish to thank Professor William Stanwood for his endless help on this thesis. This paper would not have been possible without his guidance and editing skills. Thank you for calming my nerves and making me believe in myself and my ability to write this paper. I am a more confident writer, student and person because of your help. Thank you! I wish to thank my roommate Megan Cannavina for her constant support during this whole process. Through every stress, deadline, and revision, she was there to hold me together and reminded me that “I got this”. You help me to stop doubting myself and to reach for the stars! I would also like to thank my family for their love, support and encouragement in all my academic endeavors. I am so blessed to have you all behind me for every step in my journey. I love and thank you! The History of Gender Representations in Teen Television Sandonato ii Table of Contents Acknowledgments ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- i Abstract ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 Introduction ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 Background to the Problem ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 5 Research Question ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8 Rationale --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8 Theoretical Framework --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 10 Review of the Literature -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 11 Methodology --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 22 Findings --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 27 Beverly Hills 90210 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 27 Buffy the Vampire Slayer ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 30 Smallville ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 33 One Tree Hill -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 36 Pretty Little Liars ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 39 Teen Wolf ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 42 Discussion ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 45 1990s ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 45 2000s ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 50 2010s ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 54 The Development of Gender Representations ------------------------------------------------- 58 Conclusion ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 60 References ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 62 The History of Gender Representations in Teen Television Sandonato 1 Abstract This research examines the history of gender representations in television programs designed for adolescents to discover how these portrayals have developed and changed over time in order to determine the perceived messages about stereotypical gender norms and roles for adolescents. These messages are important to decode as adolescent males and females can learn gender roles and behaviors from the teen programming that they watch on television. The study investigated the most popular teen television programs from each of the last three decades including Beverly Hills 90210, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Smallville, One Tree Hill, Pretty Little Liars and Teen Wolf. The first part of the study completed was a textual analysis of the episodes. Secondly, a content analysis was performed on all of the examples from the episodes. The codes used for this study include Language, Sex Roles, Emotionality, and Traditional Roles. Although the majority of gender messages present were normative in that they reinforced gender roles and stereotypes, the findings also suggest that gender representations are becoming less normative as the genre continues to grow and develop. Introduction Every day people all around the world are bombarded with messages from various forms of media. Television is one medium in particular that has become an integral part of the lives of people around the world. The early development of the medium was started in the 1920s, but has grown into an American staple within the last century (Jost, 1994). A statistical analysis completed in 2012 found that 104,841,846 households or 88.83% of American households own at least one television set (Conquest Statistical Datasets). This study also found that 53,447,374 households or 45.28% of American households watch prime time television during the week, from Monday to Sunday (Conquest Statistical Datasets, 2012). This data demonstrates the need to examine the messages that are being portrayed on television, as the medium is so popular among Americans. Although it may only be thought of as an entertainment medium, television can be used for a variety of different reasons such as an “escape” from reality, companionship, The History of Gender Representation in Teen Television Sandonato 2 or just out of habit (Rubin, 1983). Alan Rubin completed a study and found that participants exhibited two main viewing patterns in their motivations to watch television (1983). Although the first type of user focused on television as an entertainment medium, the second type of user was a participant that used television for information seeking (Rubin, 1983). The second type of viewers are “obviously not trying to escape from an information environment, but rather, are using television – and specific genres of informational programming – in order to learn about people, places and events and to instrumentally use this information in interpersonal interaction…” (Rubin, 1983, p. 50). Not only can viewers learn from television, but they actively use this information in their everyday lives. What if, however, a television user is not seeking information; can he or she still be affected by the messages that are being portrayed? One model of television research describes a process in which the creation of programming is not a reproduction but an intentional construction of a world and reality (Wren-Lewis, 1983). Wren-Lewis (1983) describes the encoding/decoding model of television programming as “…a product of a specific set of signifying practices (encoding) whose meanings are ultimately fixed by a second set of signifying practices (decoding)” (p. 179). This is a two-step model in which both the creation of the television show and how the viewer interprets those messages have equal weight (Wren-Lewis, 1983). Recent research (Jesnse, Bernat, Wilson & Goonewardene, 2011; Taylor & Setters, 2011) supports the idea that television messages can be used to create meaning as well as shape attitudes and behaviors. One study found that small effects of television viewing on a person’s attitudes and behaviors “can still be meaningful, especially if they The History of Gender Representation in Teen Television Sandonato 3 occur in key-decision making situations. But the present study identified a somewhat larger effect that may happen with some frequency” (Jensen, Bernat, Wilson, & Goonewardene, 2011, p.523). The researchers explain that the more a person is exposed to media that he or she derives meaning from, the more likely the media will have an effect on the person’s views and or behaviors (Jensen, Bernat, Wilson & Goonewardene, 2011). Adolescents in particular, consume a great amount of television programming. The Kaiser Family Foundation Study in January 2010 found that 8- to 18-year-olds had spent an average of four and a half hours of viewing television in a typical day (Rideout, Foehr, & Roberts, 2010). If the average adolescent spends more than four hours a day viewing television, what affect does this have on the individual’s development? Scripts, like those used in television and film, allow people to understand the cues and appropriate responses to certain scenes or situations. An adolescent’s formation of gender roles and scripts may be influenced by television portrayals. According to researcher Lionel C. Howard, gender scripts are created from the messages that adolescents receive from different sources such as peers and adults about “appropriate and inappropriate gender behaviors and characteristics” (2012, p.105). Howard also claims that gender scripts are informed by an adolescent’s “socio-cultural