A Thesis entitled Sexercise: The Influence of Sexualized Exercise Advertisements on Affect Towards Exercise and Exercise Intentions by Ashley B. Murray Submitted to the Graduate Faculty as partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts Degree in Psychology _________________________________________ Andrew Geers, Ph.D., Committee Chair _________________________________________ Jason Rose, Ph.D., Committee Member _________________________________________ John Jasper, Ph.D., Committee Member _________________________________________ Amanda Bryant-Friedrich, Dr. rer. Nat., Dean College of Graduate Studies The University of Toledo May 2017 Copyright 2017, Ashley B. Murray This document is copyrighted material. Under copyright law, no parts of this document may be reproduced without the expressed permission of the author. An Abstract of Sexercise: The Influence of Sexualized Exercise Advertisements on Affect Towards Exercise and Exercise Intentions by Ashley B. Murray Submitted to the Graduate Faculty as partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts Degree in Psychology The University of Toledo May 2017 In the past decade or so, we have seen an upsurge in advertisements aimed to increase exercise behaviors with limited success. Although success has been achieved in increasing awareness that exercise is beneficial to health (e.g. Bassuk & Manson, 2005), less than half of Americans engage in the American Heart Association’s recommended amount of weekly exercise (CDC, 2014). This has led to the increase in the use of different types of techniques to boost the effectiveness of exercise-related advertisements. One type of technique commonly used is sexualization. Whereas some research suggests that sexualization could be used as an effective technique in media advertisements to increase exercise intentions, other research suggests both that sexualization would not be an effective technique to increase exercise intentions and that sexualization of women has a variety of negative effects on women, including inducing negative affect. Recent research exploring what types of health messages are most influential at changing exercise behaviors and intentions outline the use of positive affect to change how people iii feel about engaging in exercise. This also suggests that the negative affect experienced after viewing sexualized advertisements may decrease exercise intentions. A pilot study was conducted to examine existing exercise-related advertisements for use in the present study. The pilot study found that after college students viewed sexualized advertisements, they felt less positive about engaging in exercise and believed that exercise was less beneficial than after viewing three different types of comparison advertisements. The Main Study extended the Pilot Study by filling in methodological gaps to explore the mediating effect of affect, and the moderating effect of several key variables on women’s intentions to engage in exercise after viewing exercise-related advertisements. Two hundred fifty-two female undergraduate students were randomly assigned to view and rate exercise advertisements of one of four types: neutral, positive, inspirational, or sexualized. We hypothesized that sexualized exercise advertisements will negatively influence participants’ intentions to exercise by inducing negative feelings, particularly negative feelings about ones’ body. Additionally, we hypothesized that Enjoyment of Sexualization would statistically moderate the relationship between advertisement type and affect and exercise intentions. Results indicated that the individual difference in enjoyment of sexualization produced an interaction between advertisement type and intentions to engage in exercise in the future. Specifically, regression analyses found that when those who scored higher in enjoyment of sexualization viewed sexualized ads, they had significantly higher intentions to engage in exercise after viewing the neutral advertisements, and significantly lower intentions after viewing any of the other types of advertisements. Contrary to Pilot Study findings, there was no main effect of advertisement condition on the main dependent variables, and no other hypotheses were iv supported. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed, in addition to notable limitations and future directions. v Acknowledgments A huge thanks to my awesome research assistants (in alphabetical order, because you’re all my favorite): Luiza, Maria, Kristine, Jessica. To my advisor, Andy, for pushing my writing in more ways than I could have imagined, and for everything else that an advisor has to do when their student embarks on a thesis project – thank you so much. Thank you to the rest of my committee, Jason and Dr. Jasper. To Mindy, for laying the groundwork for me seeing the media differently, and for help brainstorming throughout this project, I will never be able to thank you enough. Thanks to Gwen, for so much editing and proofreading help. Erin, thank you for answering every question I’ve had throughout this process – I probably wouldn’t have gotten my paperwork turned into the correct room without your help. To Ma – thank you for always being my support, and for showing me that women can do anything. To my dad, for the endless calls and chats that have kept me going through this journey, thanks so much. Thank you to the rest of my family, bonus family, friends, grad student friends, and Elliott for your continued love and support throughout this entire process. vi Table of Contents Abstract iii Acknowledgements vi Table of Contents vii List of Tables x List of Figures xii I. Chapter 1: Introduction 1 A. Media and Health Behaviors 2 B. Sexualization and Media 5 C. Sexualization and Effects on Women 7 D. Summary 10 E. Affect and Health Behavior 11 F. Manipulating Positive Affect 13 G. General Summary 14 II. Chapter 2: Pilot Study 16 A. Pilot Study Goals 16 B. Pilot Study Methods 17 C. Pilot Study Results 19 D. Pilot Study Discussion 21 III. Chapter 3: Main Study 23 A. Hypotheses 24 B. Participants and Design 25 C. Materials and Measures 27 vii a. Images 27 b. Advertisement Questions 27 c. Affective and Intention Questions 27 d. State Body Image 28 e. Enjoyment of Sexualization 28 f. Demographics 29 g. Attention Check Items 29 D. Procedure 29 E. Results 31 a. Hypothesis 1 33 b. Hypothesis 2 33 c. Hypothesis 3 34 d. Hypothesis 4 34 F. Discussion 39 a. Hypothesis 1 39 b. Hypothesis 2 40 c. Hypothesis 3 40 d. Hypothesis 4 40 e. Discussion of Null Results 43 f. Limitations 44 References 48 Appendices 59 A. Nike Advertisements 59 viii B. Cover Story 65 C. Advertisement Questions 66 D. Affective/Cognitive Questions 69 E. Body Image States Scale 74 F. Enjoyment of Sexualization Scale 76 G. Demographics 78 H. Attention Check Items 80 I. Potential Moderator Scales 81 J. Informed Consent 84 K. Debrief 86 L. Script 88 M. Supplemental Pilot Study Analyses 89 ix List of Tables Table 2.1 Means of advertisement groups and LSD Post Hoc Analyses of sexualized group compared to each other advertisement group from the pilot study…………………………………………… 21 Table 3.1 Summary of advertisement questions means and standard deviations by condition. ……………………………………… 32 Table 3.2 Summary of key variable means and standard deviations by condition for the Main Study…………………………………… 33 Table 3.3 Summary of Hierarchical Regression for Condition and Enjoyment of Sexualization Predicting Exercise Intentions……. 35 Table 3.4 Summary of Hierarchical Regression for Condition and Enjoyment of Sexualization Predicting Positive Affect Towards Exercise…………………………………………………………. 36 Table 3.5 Summary of Hierarchical Regression for Condition and Enjoyment of Sexualization Predicting Negative Affect Towards Exercise……………………………………………….. 36 Table 2.2 MANOVA results from the comparison of the sexualized advertisements to the affective advertisements for each question from the pilot study……………………………………………... 89 Table 2.3 MANOVA results from the comparison of the sexualized advertisements to the neutral advertisements for each question from the pilot study……………………………………………... 90 x Table 2.4 MANOVA results from the comparison of the sexualized advertisements to the inspirational advertisements for each question from the pilot study………………………………….. 91 xi List of Figures Figure 3.1 Hierarchical regression for condition and Enjoyment of Sexualization predicting exercise intention. …………………… 38 xii Chapter One Introduction Exercise has been shown to reduce the likelihood of a variety of health maladies such as heart disease, Type II diabetes, and dementia (e.g. Bassuk & Manson, 2005; Larson et al., 2006). There is also substantial evidence that regular physical activity reduces the risk of several forms of cancer, including colon, endometrial, and breast cancers (Lee & Oguma, 2006; Slattery, 2004). In addition, there is growing evidence that engaging in physical activity can also reduce the risk of lung and prostate cancer (Tardon et al., 2005). These findings, and others like them, provide a strong basis for encouraging individuals to perform regular bouts of physical activity, such as exercise. Despite the clear benefits, as of 2014 only 20.4% of Americans engage in the CDC’s recommended amount of aerobic and exercise weight training every week, and only 49.2% met the CDC’s recommended amount of aerobic exercise every week (CDC, 2014) even though awareness of the benefits of exercise is high in the United States (Morrow, Krzewinski- Malone, Jackson, Bungum, & FitzGerald, 2004). This