Objectifying media: Their effect on gender role norms and sexual harassment of women

Silvia Galdi, Anne Maass, Mara Cadinu

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Across two studies, we investigated the hypothesis that exposure to objectifying television in which women are shown as sexual objects increases the likelihood of harassing conduct.In both studies (Ns = 141; 120), male participants were exposed to one of the three TV clips in which women were portrayed (a) as sexual objects (objectifying TV), (b) in professional roles, or (c) excluded (a nature documentary).Study 1 showed that men exposed to objectifying TV reported greater proclivity to engage in sexual coercion and manifested more gender-harassing behavior than participants in the other conditions.Study 2 further demonstrated that exposure to objectifying TV increased participants’ conformity to masculine gender role norms, which, in turn, mediated the relation between experimental condition and gender harassment.Together, the two studies suggest that media content plays a central role in activating harassment-related social norms, which in turn encourage or inhibit harassing conduct.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)398-413
Number of pages16
JournalPsychology of Women Quarterly
Volume38
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 2014

Keywords

  • Masculinity
  • Mass media
  • Objectification
  • Sexual harassment
  • Television

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Gender Studies
  • Developmental and Educational Psychology
  • Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
  • General Psychology

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