Audience Perception of the Role Women in Advertisements.
Abstract
The manner of the portrayal of women in advertisement and the media in general has been a key issue of social discourse. This research investigates audiences perception of the role of women in advertisement; A study of Delta soap TV advertisement.
This study was designed as a survey and the population was made up residents of Awka North and South Local Government Area. A sample of 400 was selected from the study population via cluster techniques, questionnaire served as the data collection tool.
Analysis revealed that the audience are of the view that women are prominently Featured in advertisements and that their role in advertising is found largely on sex appeal and objectification.
However, the audience believe that use of women in advertisement including Delta soap would potentially influence consumer behaviour. The study concluded that the image of women in advertising remains detrimental to their quest for social equality and self-expression in the society.
Introduction
It has been argued overtime, that advertisements fulfil two basic purposes, which are to inform and to influence. Advertisements are made by using different appeals to create brand image, for selling products and services that are difficult to differentiate on functional attributes(Pede and Lisa2010) .
The depiction of female roles in television advertising has raised a number of provocative researches. Research in this area has been fostered by the observations of female role portrayals relative to social norms.
While the content of female roles in television advertising is well understood, the factors which influence viewers’ perceptions of these roles have received less research attention. Central to this issue is the determination of which factors explain the role of women in advertisement.
1.1 Background Of The Study
Modern advertising is only about 100 years old and the use of advertising actually dates back at least to the 10th century BC(Minh,1991) Advertising began in the colonial times and could be traced to have started in 1928 with the birth of West African Publicity Limited.
Derived from UAC ,it was established to cater for the needs of the colonial masters in Nigeria and West Africa. This company later became an advertising agency in 1929 named Lintas with two other subsidiaries namely Afromedia, the outdoor medium and PearljDean, the cinema arm.
In the 1950’s new advertising agencies emerged. The medium of advertising was in its infancy in those days Federal Government owned National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) were the only television stations that operated in the four regions of East, West, North and later Midwest(AduragbemiJay,2010).
1.1 Statement of Research Problem
Women portrayed in advertisements have evoked many perceptions and have much impact on advertised products in our modern days (AduragbemiJay,2010).The commercialization of the role of women in advertisement has been largely responsible for different perception both from old and young people alike and has had immense impact on the society.
On the other hand, there is increasing use of women being used in advertising products which bears no relation either to their physique, product advertised or needs of the audience.
Some other times, the advertised products may have positive impact on the audience and the product due to the level at which women are being portrayed and used in advertising the product.
Reference
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