University*of*Amsterdam*1*Nina*van*Hattum**
Master’s thesis
To what extent is there a difference in gender
representation in current affairs TV-programs in
Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and
Spain?
A qualitative content analysis of current affairs TV-programs EenVandaag (NL),
Aktuellt (SE), BBC Newsnight (UK) and Informe Semanal (ES)
Name:
Nina van Hattum
Student no.:
10854827
University:
University of Amsterdam
Master:
Journalism & Media
Supervisor:
Klaske Tameling
Word count:
18.710
TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of contents 2 1. Introduction 4 2. Theoretical framework 7 2.1 Media diversity 7 2.2 Gender diversity 9 2.3 Gender representation 12
3. Context & hypotheses 14
3.1 European policy on gender diversity 14
3.2 Sweden 14
3.3 The Netherlands 15
3.4 The United Kingdom 16
3.5 Spain 17 3.6 Hypotheses 17 4. Method 19 4.1 Selection of countries 19 4.2 Selection of TV-programs 20 4.3 Content analysis 22 4.4 Codebook 22
4.5 Interviews with the editors 23
4.6 Limitations and possible problems 24
5. Results 26
5.1 Hypothesis 1: Men appear more often on screen than women 26 and men are speaking longer than women.
5.2 Hypothesis 2: There are differences between male and female 29 news subjects in setting (public or private) and topics.
5.2.1 Setting 30
5.2.2 Topics 34
5.3 Hypothesis 3: To what extent is there a difference between men 38 and women in the way they are filmed? (Camera angle, perspective) 5.4 Hypothesis 4: The bigger the gender gap in the country (based on 40
the Gender Gap Report 2015), the bigger the difference in how men and women are portrayed.
5.5 Interviews with the editors 42
6. Conclusion 45
6.1 Hypothesis 1: Frequency & speech time 45
6.2 Hypothesis 2: Setting & topic 46
6.3 Hypothesis 3: Camera perspective 46
6.4 Hypothesis 4: Gender gap 47
6.5 General conclusion 48
6.6 Limitations & suggestions for future research 49
7. List of references 52
8. Appendix 56
Attachment 1: Codebook 57
Attachment 2: Codebook – Specifications camera technique 58 Attachment 3: Topic list semi-structured interview 59 Attachment 4: Interview with female editor EenVandaag 60 Attachment 5: Interview with male editor EenVandaag 61
One of the greatest challenges facing journalists, both men and women, is to resist the culture of casual stereotype in our everyday work - Aidan White, IFJ General Secretary
1. INTRODUCTION
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Journalism is one of the most important cultural, political and social institutes. It is the stories of journalists that construct and maintain our shared realities (Carey, 1989). Through the rituals of consuming and discussing journalistic content we come to understand and construct ourselves as subjects within local, national and, increasingly, global contexts (Wahl-Jorgenson, 2009:3).
In this global context, it is important that the diversity of our societies is represented as realistically as possible. As the Dutch Code of Journalism (2013) states: A journalist has the responsibility to communicate the news as truthfully as possible. The verification of facts and the display of all the representative opinions embody the pursuit of journalistic objectivity. In order to achieve journalistic objectivity, it is expected that mass media (television, print, radio, internet) show the diversity within a society as representative as possible.
The reflection of a diverse society in media messages is seen as an important contribution to the democratic system. The content of news has to reflect the cultural, political and demographic diversity of a society as fair as possible (McQuail, 1992). This thesis will focus on one of the most discussed issues in the field of diversity in the media: gender diversity.
For the past decades, the gender diversity in the media has been studied thoroughly. In spite of the progress made over the last 25 years—and there are more women in media and more female executives than ever before—media still churn out female stereotypes that limit the power of women in society (Unesco, 2009: IV). The repetitive use of gender stereotypes affects the public’s perception of reality Unesco (2009:13). Research shows that the way men and women are portrayed in the news has influence on the way we construct our shared realities and the way we look at society.
In regard to the influences of news, gender representation is a topic that has been widely discussed in the scientific field of journalism. Research shows that in journalistic products, women are often underrepresented (Rodgers & Thorson, 2003; Rodgers, Thorson, & Antecol, 2001, Gibbons, 2000; Potter, 1985; Zoch & Turk, 1998 in Len-Ríos et al. 2005:154). The Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP, 2015) shows that women (24%) appear less frequently on screen as news subjects than men (76%). Previous studies also show that there are differences in how men and women are represented in the news. De Clercq (2003:104) states that men are often shown in a more formal and professional setting, whereas women will often be placed in private settings, like home. Previous studies also show that women are most often shown in so-called ‘soft’ news items, like culture and wellbeing. This in contrast with men, who
are consequently seen more often in the ‘hard’ news-topics like politics and economics (De Swert & Hooghe, 2010).
Gender representation is an important topic for the scientific field of journalism as well as for journalists in the field. As Wood (1994:231) states, media are the most pervasive and one of the most powerful influences on how we view men and women. Media and the news are woven through our daily lives and influence the way we look at each other. It is important for journalists to be aware of the fact that women are often underrepresented in the media and that men and women are portrayed in stereotypical ways that reflect and sustain socially endorsed views of gender (Wood, 1994:13). For journalists, it is one of the greatest challenges to resist the culture of casual stereotype in their everyday work. In every region and culture there are fixed images, deeply entrenched prejudices and biased reflexes that pose challenges to journalists and media (Unesco, 2009:IV).
These entrenched prejudices and biased reflexes are not the same for every region or culture. Since gender diversity is embedded in the socio-cultural backgrounds, it is interesting to explore how different countries show men and women in the news on television. The Global Media Monitoring Project (2010), known as the GMMP, has been documenting differences in portrayal and representation of women and men in news media discourse and imagery around the world (GMMP, 2010: vvi). Their research shows that there are big differences between continents and countries in the way they portray men and women. These differences depend on the cultural underpinnings of gender inequality and discrimination against women, which are reinforced through the media (GMMP, 2010: iv).
This thesis will aim to give insight in these country-based differences in gender
representation by analysing current affairs TV-programs of four different countries1.
This thesis will not focus on the mass media in general as this includes also non-fictional elements. For this thesis, the goal is to get insight in gender representation in news, broadcasted by public channels. For the field of journalism studies, it is interesting to reflect upon views on gender in news broadcasting to find out more about how stereotypes play a role in the news and how they are created. It is interesting to look further than just counting how many men and women appear on screen. To do that, the focus will not only be limited to the frequency of appearance, but it will also look at where the subjects are positioned, how long they talk and how they are filmed. This information will give extra insight and transparency in the actual differences in representation.
In order to provide transparency in how news represent the sexes on television, this thesis will focus on gender representation by providing a qualitative content analysis of current affairs TV-programs in four European countries. The analysis will be done to give insight in the differences between current affairs TV-programs of the following four countries and TV-programs: Sweden (Aktuellt), The Netherlands (EenVandaag), The United Kingdom (BBC Newsnight), Spain (Informe Semanal). The
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countries are selected based on several criteria. Firstly, they all have a different position on the Gender Gap Report Rating 2015. Secondly, I had to be able to understand the content of the TV-program and therefore I was limited to choose countries of which she understands the language. By providing an extensive content analysis in combination with interviews with editors, the main research question of this study will be answered:
To what extent is there a difference in gender representation in current affairs TV-programs in Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and Spain?
To answer the main research question, in the next chapter (Chapter 2) the theoretical framework will be explored. In this theoretical framework the following concepts will be conceptualised: media diversity, gender diversity and gender representation (Chapter 2). In Chapter 3, the context of the four selected countries will be explored. Chapter 4 will describe the method of this study. In Chapter 5 the results will be presented. Finally, in the Conclusion (Chapter 6), conclusions will be drawn to give an answer to the main research question. In this last chapter, the limitations and suggestions for future research will be described, as well as the theoretical implications.
2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This thesis will focus on gender representation and gender diversity in the media. In the scientific field of journalism, a lot of research has been done on these concepts. Hust (2008:98) states that research over the past 50 years has asked to what extent the media are an accurate reflection of the proportion of men and women in the society, as well as the extent to which the activities and values portrayed are diverse. Previous studies have mainly focused on the way men and women are represented in the media and if this is a realistic representation of society.
In order to understand the role of gender representation and gender diversity in the media, it is important to look at the broader perspective of diversity in the media first. Therefore, this chapter will start by conceptualising ‘media diversity’. The second concept that will be conceptualised is ‘gender diversity’ in the media. The final concept, which will be a central concept in this thesis, is ‘gender representation'. 2.1 MEDIA DIVERSITY
In most democratic countries, media diversity is considered to be of crucial value. Van Cuilenburg (1999: 188) states that it is a central objective of communications and media policy. The concept ‘media diversity’ refers to the actual content of media. It is therefore defined as the degree in which media content is heterogeneous (Van Cuilenburg 1999: 188). McQuail (1992) states that its heterogeneity is important since it is the purpose of the media to reflect the diversity in the content. The reflection in the content should be as representative as possible.
Within the conceptualisation of media diversity, there are three different normative frameworks that can be distinguished. McQuail and Van Cuilenburg (1983) see media diversity through a reflective framework, where the media’s purpose is to reflect the truth like it were a mirror (Vandenberghe et al., 2014:45). Within this framework media should relate to society in such a way that it reflects the preferences, opinions, groups, positions and other characteristics as it appears in the population (Van Cuilenburg, 1999:190). The differences in politics, culture, religion, and social conditions in society must proportionally reflect the real population, like a mirror. The second framework, the constructivist approach, criticizes the idea that the purpose of the media is to represent and reflect reality (Vandeberghe et al. 2014:45). Orgad (2012) states that the idea of representing reality like a mirror is not possible. Any representation is inherently and inevitably a selective and particular depiction of some element of reality. It is never possible to generate all meanings and all depictions of reality. There will always be elements of reality that will be excluded. Vandeberghe et al. (2014:6) state that in constructivist framework an ‘objective’ reality does not exist. Thus, it is not possible for media to reflect diversity in a society in a perfectly proportional manner in journalistic content
A third approach to media diversity is called open diversity and is defined as the extent to which divergent preferences, perspectives and opinions are quantitatively (i.e. statistically) equally represented in the media content (Van Cuilenburg, 2005:302; Commissariaat van de Media, 2015a). In this framework, the purpose of the media is to reflect the opinions and preferences of both the majority groups and the minority group. According to this approach media is a pervasive social phenomenon that could influence people considerably; therefore its content should express different opinions in an equal manner (Van Cuilenburg, 2007:29). From theoretical point of view, open diversity is the maximum diversity any media system can realize, because it has to represent all groups, preferences and characteristics (statistically) equally. The three different approaches to media diversity described above show that there is no consensus in how journalistic content should represent society. In reflection of these frameworks, it is important to consider the differences between theory and practice. In a theoretically ideal perspective the content of all journalists would show the pluriform society through the open diversity approach. No group, perspective, characteristic of preferences would be unequally represented.
However, looking at the daily practice this seems impossible. Even the reflective approach, where reality should be like that of a mirror, seems impossible in practice. The journalist can only try to approach an ideal form of working, where reality is represented as realistically as possible. This last consideration seems to reflect the
constructivist approach, stating that it is not possible to have a depiction of an
’objective’ reality. According this approach it is not possible for media to reflect diversity in a society in a perfectly proportional manner.
Since this thesis is about gender, you could say that there is an ‘objective’ reality in how many men and women there are in the world. According to the United Nations (2015), in 2015, 50.4 % of the world’s population is male and 49.6 % is female. Knowing this, the news could potentially reflect reality; therefore the reflective approach will be used in this thesis. In that approach, media diversity is defined as follows: Through the reflective approach, media diversity should relate to society in
such a way that it reflects the preferences, opinions, groups, positions and other characteristics as it appears in the population (Van Cuilenburg, 1999:190).
So far, the above has described diversity in the media. But ‘the media’ is a very broad concept that includes digital media, broadcast media, social media, film, radio, newspaper, magazines, websites etc. Also ‘the media’ includes both fictional and non-fictional content. This thesis will focus one part of the media: the news. Specifically it will look at state-owned current affairs TV-programs. In order to understand what news actually is, this needs to be defined.
News is a difficult concept to define, as it is everywhere. Rantanen (2009:128) states that news could be anything from news stories to new stories, comments and information, or possibly all these categories at once. Since news is no longer limited to newspapers, radio and television, but has had a vast expansion on the web, its
traditional definition seems to no longer conform to the current media landscape. To include all these elements into one concept, Van Dijk (2013:3) defines it as news items or news reports (i.e. a text or discourse on radio, on TV, in the newspaper, online) in which new information is given about recent events.
This thesis will focus on only one of those elements of Van Dijk’s definition: the news in current affairs TV-programs. It is important to keep in mind that the previous studies, which have used as the basis for this thesis, often use a broader definition. So, when previous research is used that describes ‘the news’, keep in mind that it is more than just a newspaper or television program. Another important element is that a lot of previous research has been done about ‘the media’, and this is not always aimed only and specifically at ‘news’. Therefore, when reading this thesis, one must take into account that some previous research also includes television programs, newspapers, magazines, online content, that includes non-fictional content. I have tried to choose research that specifically focuses on news in the media, to make sure the most relevant scientific information was used.
With this in mind, this thesis will look at the heterogeneity of news content in regard to gender diversity. In order to elaborate on the differences in how men and women are represented in news content, it is important to conceptualize gender diversity. 2.2 GENDER DIVERSITY
In order to analyse gender representation in the news, it has to be clear what gender is. Nanda (2014:1-3) states that gender refers to the social, cultural and psychological constructions that are imposed on the biological differences of sex. So besides the biological differences between men and women, it is important to also take other factors in account. In order to understand gender, one must also look at the cultural, social en psychological differences. Therefore, she defines gender diversity as gender roles that go further than the binary opposition of male and female; man and woman (Nanda, 2014:1).
It is important to look at gender diversity in media because it plays a role in shaping our identity. Gauntlet (2008:1) states that with the media containing so many images of women and men, and messages about women, men and sexuality today, it is clear that these ideas have impact on our sense of identity.
It is difficult to give one definition of gender diversity because it is shaped by many factors. Nanda (2014:4) states that gender diversity must always be analysed in connection with other cultural patterns, because its interpretation varies both among and within cultures. In order to understand the context of gender diversity in a particular society, this must always be done whilst taking the cultural patterns in mind. Factors such as ideology, class, age and race affect the interpretation of gender diversity. Even in multi-gendered cultures, gender diversity always exists against a background of what it means to be male or female, man or woman in a particular society (Nanda, 2014:4).
Besides the cultural patterns, the conceptualisation of gender diversity is also affected by time. Over the past few decades, the ideas of ‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ have changed a lot. Gauntlet (2008:11) states that masculinity is still seen as the state of ‘being a man’, which is currently in flux. Femininity, on the other hand, is perceived more as a stereotype of a women’s role in the past. There is plenty of evidence that traditional femininity is no longer popular. The old stereotypical concepts of women - passivity, reticence, assuming that men and authority figures are always right – are redundant, because traditional femininity is becoming less popular (Gauntlett, 2008:12). It seems that the traditional concepts of ‘femininity’ and ‘masculinity’ are becoming increasingly irrelevant today. Mainly because new generations are becoming more accepting towards the irrelevance of gender and women continue to get stronger positions in society, limiting the differences between men and women.
Even though it seems that the lines between what is masculine and feminine are blurring, there are still clear differences in gender representation in the news. In this thesis these differences are analysed, using Nanda’s (2014:1) definition of gender diversity: it is the gender roles that go further than the binary opposition of male and female, where gender is defined as the social, cultural and psychological constructions that are imposed on the biological differences of sex.
Research about how men and women are represented in the media focuses on different elements. By looking at the context, setting, topics, social and cultural factors, a clear image is shaped on what exactly differs in representing men and women. These different elements will be explained below.
When looking at the frequency of appearance, research shows that there is an underrepresentation of women in news broadcasting (Len-Ríos et al. 2005; Vandeberghe 2014; Shor et al. 2015; Hust 2008; House of Lords 2015; Cunningham 2004; Byerely 2013, GMMP, 2010; GMMP, 2015). The Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP, 2015) has been documenting differences in portrayal and representation of women and men in news media discourse and imagery around the world. In 2015, the report monitored 114 countries. Their data shows that although women make up 51,4% of the worlds population, they are underrepresented in news broadcasting. As news subject, 24% was female, compared to 76% men. Several other studies, in which a content analysis was done, show that on average, three out of four news subjects are male (Zoch & VanSlycke Turk 1988; Len-Ríos et al. 2005). In these content analyses, newspapers, television programs and online productions were analysed. All studies showed that the women underrepresented.
This can be linked to the theory of symbolic annihilation, a concept from the social sciences developed by Grebner & Gross (1976). Symbolic annihilation describes the underrepresentation, or absence of representation of a particular group in the media. By not representing, or only representing a particular group in a specific context, the media determine if a group is part of society or not (Silverstone, 2008; Grebner & Gross 1976). On abstract level, representation in the fictional world
signifies social existence, absence means symbolic annihilation (Grebner & Gross, 1976:182). When referring to gender, this means that if systematically representing less women than men, the media feed the idea that women play a less important and powerful role in society than men (Vandeberghe, 2014:8).
But is it possible to prevent symbolic annihilation in news? Does news promise to be an exact reflection of society? As we defined news earlier, it is seen as news items or news reports (i.e. a text or discourse on radio, on TV, in the newspaper, online) in which new information is given about recent events (Van Dijk, 2013:3). If you look at news as an institutional organ, it is clear that men still have higher positions than women in many work fields. In Europe, there are gender differences at the top positions, so it is realistic to expect that news represent men and women equally? Research of the European Commission shows that women account for 21.2% of board members of large publicly listed companies registered in the EU countries (European Commision, 2015). If news is mostly institutionally orientated and women play a smaller role than men, it seems that misrepresentations is impossible to prevent.
However, the European Commission (2015) notes that these gender differences need
to change: ‘They stem from traditional gender roles and stereotypes. The lack of
support for women and men needs to be balanced in work and political and corporate cultures’. In relation to media and news broadcasting, the EU has developed a strategy to break the gender stereotypes in the media. They state that the media are still depicting public life as being a male domain, that as more and more women are playing an active role in society this should be more appropriately reflected in the news (European Commission, 2010).
So even though the news cannot be an exact reflection of society, it still seems that some form of symbolic annihilation is taking place, as women are not appropriately reflected, both in numbers, but also in the way they are represented. Representation is not just based on how often men and women are shown on screen. There are more factors that influence the way we perceive gender differences. Firstly, there are gender differences in the setting in which news subjects are filmed. De Clercq (2003:104) shows that men are shown more often in professional, formal and pragmatic settings. Women, on the other hand, are often placed in private, informal, familial settings.
British and American research shows that women are represented in the so-called ‘soft and social’ news themes whilst men are shown in the ‘hard’ news themes, like politics or economics (Craft & Wanta, 2004; Ross & Carter, 2011; House of Lords, 2015:8). As Allan (1998:133) argues:
The means by which ‘hard’ news is accorded an enhanced ‘prestige’ status over the ‘lighter’ items of ‘soft’ news are linked, in part, to its greater reliance on monologic renderings of news events. This perspective is also discernible in the attendant presumption that women’s everyday lives are intrinsically less ‘newsworthy’ as a result.
Allan’s statement from 1998 seems a little out-dated in the modern Western society we live in. But still today, it seems that the representation of men and women in the news suits this statement. This thesis is going to analyse to what extent Allan’s (1998) statement is still representative in today’s modern Western society. Gauntlet (2008:3) states that the modern Western world is an odd mix of equal and unequal. Women and men may ‘feel’ equal but at the same time are aware that this is kind of inaccurate.
In Western society, the distinction of what is masculine and feminine is blurring. A more open view is developing towards gender diversity and sexual diversity. Gauntlet (2008:13) states that in time, Western societies are becoming more accepting of sexual diversity. Even though gays, bisexuals and lesbians continue to face discrimination and prejudice, a more accepting attitude towards sexual diversity is developing. As Western societies get more accepting towards gender diversity, it is interesting to look at how men and women are represented. In order to understand how men and women are represented, the concept ‘gender representation’ will be conceptualised below.
2.3 GENDER REPRESENTATION
Central elements in this thesis are imaging and representation. Imaging is seen as a process that occurs when there’s an interaction between material images and mental images in our minds (thoughts, associations) (De Clercq, 2003:80). Smelik (1999:6) distinguished three levels in the imaging process. The first level is based on materiality; these are the actual images that are given by the media. The second level is centred on the effect; this is the emergence of mental images, potentially resulting in behaviour (Smelik, 1999:6). At this level, stereotypical conceptions about men and women can be developed. The third level is based on the actual influence, where a possible change of mental imaging can lead to new material imaging (Smelik, 1999:6).
As a theoretical concept, imaging refers to a process of how we construct meaning. This process also happens when we construct meaning about how we think of gender, or how we think about ‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ (De Clercq, 2008:13). Hall (1986) states that there are many different and conflicting ways in which we construct meaning to the world around us. In order to do that, it is of great importance to look at who is represented and in what way. It is even more important to see who or what is regularly underrepresented, because what we know about our society depends on how it is represented (Hall, 1986).
This thesis will be based on the first level of Smelik’s (1999) imaging process; the level of materiality. This is the most well defined level of the imaging process as it refers to the actual, material images. The representation of the content of these images is formed by what is portrayed in those material images.
When looking at gender representation at a material level, research shows that differences can be found in countless subtle things: the selection of images, the point of view, the setting, the interview style, the questions asked, the camera use, the interview time and the status (Gallagher, 2001:192, Smelik, 2000:146 in De Clercq (2003:82). All these elements have effect on how men and women are represented and therefore affect how the public sees gender.
To explain the way representation can affect views on gender representation, the
cultivation theory can be used. The cultivation theory looks at the effect of news on
behaviour and is based on how the public responds to journalistic content. This theory states that way the news represents reality influences the prevailing ideas within a society (Gerbner & Gross, 1976). Research on the cultivation theory examines the extent to which cumulative exposure to television contributes to certain views about social reality.
When looking at this theory in relation to gender representation, it is found that media users guess the proportion of men and women in certain positions in society based on the proportions of men and women represented in those positions in the news (Vandeberghe, 2014:15). In this way, gender stereotypes are maintained. Often women get the gender role of mother, or are expected to be of less status than men (Vandeberghe 2014:15). Les-Rios et al. (2005) state that based on the cultivation theory, the news cultivates their audience to see women as having a lower status and men with power and a high status.
The problematic aspect of gender representation is that it can hinder or hasten structural advancements towards gender equality. News organizations play a determining role in forming society’s perceptions and behaviours and have to combat against stereotypes (Council of Europe, 2014:15).
In order to understand how these stereotypes are formed it is important to understand the sociocultural contexts. Based on the literature, this thesis will try to analyse to what extent the media in different Western European countries fulfil the role of combating against stereotypes and equally representing men and women. Since gender diversity plays an important role in the news in the Western European countries, it is important to get insight in the context and the policies on gender balance. Therefore, the next chapter will describe the context of European policy on gender diversity. It will also give insight in the policies and media landscape of the four countries that will be analysed in this thesis.
3 CONTEXT & HYPOTHESIS
In this chapter the four hypotheses for this thesis will be presented. But first, the media landscape of the four selected countries (Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and Spain) will be described. This chapter will start by giving a general description of the European policy on gender diversity. Next, per country, the policies and media landscape will be presented. In the final part of this chapter, four hypotheses will be formulated.
3.1 EUROPEAN POLICY ON GENDER DIVERSITY
As Nanda (2014:4) states, the concept of gender diversity must always be analysed taking in mind cultural patterns. (Western) European policy plays an important role in the representation of gender diversity in the media. Hoffman-Riem (1987) states that the media are given the task to offer citizens accessible and pluralistic information, and this consists of four subcomponents: diversity in formats and topics, diversity in content, diversity in people and geographical diversity.
In order to fulfil the four subcomponents, the Council of Europe Gender Equality Strategy (2014-2017) was developed. The aim of this strategy is for media to show equal visibility, responsibility, participation and empowerment of men and women in all spheres of public and private life (Council of Europe, 2013:1). By encouraging media to pursue policies to promote gender equality, they want them to combat gender stereotypes.
The Western European national governments play an active and regulatory role in the implementation of gender-policy in the media. At national level, the government enforces a diversity policy where the public broadcaster is deemed responsible to give an as balanced picture as possible for the entire population (Vandeberghe, 2014:10). The Council of Europe (2014) did an assessment of eighteen countries in Europe on how they were implementing the diversity policy. Based on those assessments it was concluded that there is a strong need to pursue efforts for gender equality to become a reality in media landscape (Council of Europe, 2014:6).
In order to order understand the contexts and media landscape of the TV-programs of the four countries, a short overview of the gender policies and cultural influences of each country will be given below.
3.2 SWEDEN
Gender equality has been a trademark for Sweden and the other Nordic countries for decades (Edstrom, 2013: 78). Sweden, with its 9.5 millions inhabitants, is a country where the equality of men and women is a very important part of culture and society. It is one of the corner stones of governmental policy. The Swedish Government states that the objective of gender equality policy is that women and men are to
have the same power to shape society and their own lives (Government Offices of Sweden, 2015).
This policy also affects the Swedish media landscape, which is divided up in public and private broadcasters. From all the TV viewers, 35% watch the public service channel, SVT. Edstrom (2013:85) has researched gender in the Swedish media landscape and notes that an interesting situation is arising as newsrooms are starting to develop strategies to increase participation of women in news. These newsrooms are becoming increasingly gender-aware and try to show that the lack of representation of women in the news can be changed by gender sensitive leadership, monitoring gender in relation to measurable goals and by creating more gender awareness on the work floor (2013:88).
Despite these positive changes towards gender equality, women are still in the minority in the news. Research shows that 31% of the news subjects are female, and 69% are male (GGMP, 2015). According to Edstrom (2013:87) this can be explained by the newsroom culture. Research shows that clear gender logic is still present in the Swedish newsrooms, where, even though gender order is changing, male norms are still dominant (Djerf Pierre, 2007).
Despite the dominance of male norms, of the four countries analysed in this thesis, Sweden has least gender differences. Carter (in House of Lords, 2015:10) suggests that the success of Sweden is a result of greater cultural acceptance of women in the newsroom, training for report and national gender policies on work. These are reasons that Sweden is more successful gender representation in news and current affairs than The UK, Spain and The Netherlands.
3.3 THE NETHERLANDS
The Dutch media landscape exists of both commercial and public news broadcasters. The Nederlandse Publieke Omroep (NPO) is the state-owned broadcaster and has three channels (NPO1, NPO2, NPO3).
The Dutch government states that they feel responsible for implementing policies on gender equality. They argue that there should be equal opportunities and rights for women. Women’s full participation in society and decision-making are crucial for nation and international security and stability (Ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken, 2011). In order to ensure gender balance in the media, a committee (Commissariaat voor de Media - CvdM) was introduced that monitors the broadcasters. It checks if the rules in the Dutch Media Acts are implemented.
Every five years a new plan with goals is made for the NPO. Recently, the CvdM concluded that the NPO did not realise the gender balance-agreement between 2010-2015. One of the agreements was that by 2015 there should be more women on TV. But instead of an increase there was a decrease. In 2010, there were 37,6% women on the NPO, in 2015 this was decreased to 35,4% (Commissariaat voor de
Media, 2015b).
The results from the Gender Media Monitoring Project (2015) show that 27% of the news subjects are female, and 73% are male. The news shows argue that this is because they cannot find the relevant women (Council of Europe, 2014:29). But the main argument of the Dutch news organisations is that the structures in society make it difficult to get more women on screen. It is still the case that men have many more high positions; one in eleven women is board member, and one in six is professor, therefore it is difficult to get an equal representation (Bronzwaer, 2015).
3.4 THE UNITED KINGDOM
The United Kingdom, with 64.1 million inhabitants, has many broadcasters. The public, state-owned provider, the BBC (British Broadcast Corporation) is the most prominent one. The big commercial broadcaster is ITV, which also broadcasts current affairs and news. Both organizations are monitored by the government, to ensure that they show minority groups in a representative and responsible manner (Mendes, 2013).
The UK Government states that media should be free from state intervention, because this is fundamental to democracy. However, it does see a responsible role for the media to recognize the portrayal of women (UK Government, 2011:15). The results from the Gender Media Monitoring Project confirm this, because 30% of all the news subjects are female, whereas 70% are male. Ross (2010:89) states that this is not equal because of the male dominance on the workfloor: ‘what we see, read and hear is mostly news about men’.
According to Mendes (2013) the problem lies in the representation of men and women on the work floor. She did research on the media landscape of The United Kingdom and concludes that in theory, there are equal opportunities for men and women, but in practice this is not implemented; women are still marginalized in the newsrooms, especially in the decision-making hierarchies. The result of this is that it is still seen as an old boys’ club (Mendes, 2013). This also influences the news content, as women have less to say about decisions; the production of the news is still dominated by decisions made by men.
In order to ensure gender balance, most news English organizations implement gender-equality policies. The House of Lords (2015:36) states that the public broadcaster has a responsibility to reflect society by setting the standard in ensuring gender balance: ‘We consider that, because news and current affairs has such scope to inform society, all broadcasters have a particular duty of responsibility in this area’ (House of Lords, 2015:14).
3.5 SPAIN
The television market of Spain is becoming increasingly fragmented, as more and more channels are developed. There are local and national broadcasters, both public and private. The public broadcaster is Radio Televisíon Española (RTVE) and has two channels (La 1 and La 2).
Gallego (2013) describes the media landscape of Spain as one with many women, who have little power. As 65% of the journalism degrees are received by women, but only little women (21.8%) have high positions on the work floor. The situation on the work floor is seen as one of the main reasons women are represented less in the news than men. In Spain, 29% of the news subjects are female, whereas 71% is male (GGMP, 2015).
In the past decades, Spain has undergone a rapid social change regarding women’s roles. Still under a dictatorial regime in 1976, it is now become a modernised country with special gender laws and policies. Nowadays, approximately half (55%) of the Spanish news companies have gender-equality policies. Gallego (2010:172) states that Spanish laws promote gender equality, but many companies – even some public companies – have shown resistance to implementing such policies. The policies are in compliance with the Gender Equality act, but Gallego states that of such plans, not much has been seen yet.
Still, plans are being made to improve this. A Strategic Plan on Equal Opportunities for 2014-2016 has been approved; the aim of this plan is to avoid the sexist representation of the image of women in the media and in the news (Council of Europe, 2014). One of the cornerstones of this plan is to cooperate with the public channels to encourage effective and egalitarian representation of women.
3.6 HYPOTHESES
Now that all the concepts have been defined, and the context of the media landscape has been described, several hypotheses are formulated in order to answer the main research question: To what extent is there a difference in gender
representation in current affairs TV-programs in Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and Spain? In this thesis an analysis will be done to give insight in
the differences in gender representation between the current affairs TV-programs - Sweden (Aktuellt), The Netherlands (EenVandaag), The United Kingdom (BBC Newsnight), Spain (Informe Semanal). This thesis will be focussing on four different elements of gender representation.
Based on the literature, the first hypotheses will focus on two aspects: the frequency of appearance and speech time. By looking at how often are men and women shown on screen a conclusion can be drawn on frequency of appearance. Research shows that there is in underrepresentation in the media (Len-Ríos et al. 2005; Vandeberghe
2014; Shor et al. 2015; Hust 2008; House of Lords 2015; Cunningham 2004; Byerely 2013; GMMP, 2010; GMMP, 2015). The Global Media Monitoring Project (2015) shows that of the news subjects, women (24%) are shown a lot less than men (76%). This would also mean that men have longer speech time. Therefore, for the first hypothesis it is expected that men appear more often on screen than women and
men have more speech time than women
The second hypothesis that will be discussed will give insight in the setting and topics in which men and women are represented. De Clercq (2003:104) states that men are represented in a more formal, public and pragmatic setting, and that women are shown in more familial, private settings. Research also shows that women are represented in the so-called ‘soft and social’ news themes whilst men are shown in the ‘hard’ news, like politics or economics (Craft & Wanta, 2004; Ross & Carter, 2011; House of Lords, 2015:8). Therefore, the second hypothesis states that there are
differences between male and female news subjects in setting (public or private) and topics2.
The third hypothesis is focussed on how men and women are shown on screen. Here the way of filming is analysed. By looking at camera angle and perspective it can be analysed if men are shown on screen differently than women. Not a lot of research is done about this in relation to news. Therefore this will be an exploratory hypothesis, which will be analysed based on the following question: To what extent is there a
difference between men and women in the way they are filmed? (Camera angle, perspective)
The last element that will be analysed is the differences between the four European countries - Sweden (Aktuellt), The Netherlands (EenVandaag), The United Kingdom (BBC Newsnight) and Spain (Informe Semanal). This will be done based on the Gender Gap Report (2015) that quantifies the magnitude of gender-based disparities. By looking at gender gaps on economic, political, education and health criteria, the Gender Gap Report provides a country ranking. On this ranking, Sweden (#4) is ranked highest, followed by The Netherlands (#13) and The United Kingdom (#18). From the countries analysed in this thesis, Spain (#25) is the lowest in this ranking. Based on this ranking the fourth hypothesis states that the bigger the
gender-gap in the country the bigger the difference in how men and women are portrayed.
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4. METHOD
For this thesis a qualitative content analysis will be done. In order to elaborate on the hypotheses stated earlier and to answer the research question, current affairs TV-programs of the public channel of four European countries will be analysed. Per country eight episodes will be studied using a codebook (see attachment 1 & 2) that has been set up a priori. Per episode an exploration will be done on (1) how often men and women are on screen, (2) how long they speak, (3) the setting and topics they are filmed in, (4) which camera perspective is used to film them.
Additional to the content analysis, interviews will be done with two editors, who are experts in the field and can explain how gender representation plays a role in their work as an editor. One male and one female editor will be interviewed. This will be done to get additional insight in the choices that are being made around gender representation.
In this chapter, first the selection of the countries will be described. Secondly, the selection of the TV-programs will be elaborated upon. Thirdly, an insight in the codebook will be given. And finally, the method of the qualitative interviews with the editors will be described.
4.1 SELECTION OF COUNTRIES
For this thesis, it was chosen to focus on four countries within Europe (Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom, Spain). Table 1 shows the amount of female news subjects by region from 1995 until 2015 (GMMP, 2015). This provides information about gender representation on the global and regional level. When looking at the values for Europe, there is a clear increase in the percentage of female news subjects. In 1995 only 16% of the news subjects was female, in 2015 this was already 26%. Europe though, does not have the highest amount of female news subjects; North America (36%), Latin America (29%), The Caribbean (29%) and the Pacific (26%) score higher. Remarkable is that for most continents the percentage has increased or stabilized since 2010, but for Europe, there was a decrease of 1 per cent from 2010 to 2015.
Female news subjects by region: 1995 – 2015 in percentages (%) 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 Africa 22 11 19 19 22 Asia 14 17 19 20 20 Caribbean 22 24 25 25 29 Europe 16 19 21 26 25 Latin America 15 20 23 29 29 Middle East 14 15 15 16 18 North America 27 25 26 28 36 Pacific 20 25 26 25 26 Overall 17 18 21 24 24
Table 1 - Table showing the amount of news subjects by region from 1995 till 2015
in percentages (%) – Presence of women in print, radio and television news. Source: Global Media Monitoring Project 2015
In 2015, Europe (25%) scored 1% higher than the overall score of all the regions (24%). For this thesis, both the overall scores as well as the European scores will be used for comparison. These values will be used to compare gender representation the four different countries selected for this thesis – Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom, Spain.
The countries are selected based on several criteria. First of all, they all have a different position on the Gender Gap Report Rating 2015. Secondly, I had to be able to understand the content of the TV-program and therefore I was limited to choose countries of which I understands the language. The countries that are chosen are listed below, also showing their rating on the Gender Gap Report (2015). The lower the ranking, the bigger the gender gap within that country.
#4 Sweden
#13 The Netherlands #18 The United Kingdom #25 Spain
For this thesis it is important to understand the cultural context, the policies and the current situation of those countries in order to understand how gender diversity plays a role in the media. This information has been described per country in the theoretical framework. Per country, one current affairs TV-program has been selected, this will be described below.
4.2 SELECTION OF TV-PROGRAMS
For the selection of the TV-programs it is important to find the most comparable shows, this in order to make the comparison between the programs is as reliable as possible. Of course the content and the structure of the shows will differ, but to make
the selection as relevant as possible, two criteria were used. First of all, the show has to be broadcasted on a state-owned public channel. Secondly, it has to be a current affairs TV-program, consisting of several reportages that show the background behind the news.
The official BBC (2006) definition of a current affairs program will be used for this thesis: "A program which contains explanation and analysis of current events and issues, including material dealing with political or industrial controversy or with public policy. Also included are investigative programs with contemporary significance". Based on these criteria and the BBC definition, several researchers in the different countries were contacted in order to decide which TV-program would be most suitable for the analysis. The TV-programs that were chosen are listed below:
Sweden Aktuellt
The Netherlands EenVandaag
The United Kingdom Newsnight
Spain Informe Semanal
For the analyses, eight episodes of the above stated TV-programs will be analysed. With that, a total of 32 episodes will be analysed. In order to understand the similarities and differences between the TV-programs, a short description of each show is given below.
AKTUELLT (SWEDEN)
Aktuellt is a Swedisch current affairs program. It is broadcasted nightly on the second national channel (SVT2) and produced by Sveriges Television (SVT). Every episode lasts around 45 minutes and covers three to five items of the day’s news, in detail. SVT describes the program as: “Aktuellt, is an in-depth news program, which provides analyses, debates and longer reportages“ (Aktuellt, 2015).
EENVANDAAG (THE NETHERLANDS)
EenVandaag is the Dutch current affairs program. It is broadcasted every night, except for Sundays, on the first national channel (NPO 1). One episode lasts approximately 30 minutes and consists of three to four reportages. It is produced by AVROTROS and is described as: “A current affairs program that shows backgrounds of the news independently, impartially and free from external influences. We analyse news developments in an understandable way, and bring it to a large and diverse public” (EenVandaag, 2015).
BBC NEWSNIGHT (THE UNITED KINGDOM)
BBC Newsnight is current affairs program from The United Kingdom. It is a weekday show and is broadcasted on BBC Two, one of the national channels. Episodes last around 45 minutes and consist of analysis, reportages, debates and interviews. The
broadcaster describes the program as follows: “Newsnight is the BBC's flagship news and current affairs program, noted for its in-depth analysis and often robust cross-examination of senior politicians” (BBC, 2015).
INFORME SEMANAL
The Spanish current affairs show, Informe Semanal, is a weekly show, which is broadcasted every Saturday on La 1 RTVE, the first public channel network of Spain. The episodes are produced by RTVE and last approximately 60 minutes. It consists of four reports about themes like politics, economy, culture and society. RTVE describes the program as “A weekly report that shows international news about national issues, society, culture and entertainment” (RTVE, 2015).
4.3 CONTENT ANALYSIS
In order to get insight in how men and women are represented in the above-described current affairs TV-programs, a content analysis will be done. In journalism studies the content analysis can be used to verify results of the journalistic production process (Palacios & Díaz-Noci, 2009:110). For this thesis, in order to verify the results of the journalistic process, a total of 32 episodes will be analysed. This will be done with a codebook, which has been set up a priori.
4.4 CODEBOOK
For this thesis, the focus of the analysis will be on the news subjects of the TV-programs. The news subjects are defined as the people are interviewed, or the people whom are in the news. There will be no focus on the hosts of the TV-show, nor the people in the studio. Only the reportages/items of the TV-programs will be analysed. This will be done with a codebook (see attachment 1), which will focus on four central elements: topic, subject, frequency, setting and camera techniques. The first element of the codebook is the topic. This will be done in order to get insight in how men and women are portrayed and framed. The topic of the reportage will be noted down. Previous research (GMMP, 2015) shows that there is a difference in how men and women are portrayed when looking at the news topics. Table 2 shows the presence of women and men in European news as news subjects.
Presence of women and men in European news as news subjects in different news topics (in percentages, %)
Topic Female news
subject Male news subjects
Politics and Government 19 81
Economy 21 79
Science and Health 37 63
Social and Legal 27 73
Crime and Violence 27 73
Celebrity, Arts & Media, Sports 26 74
Other 37 63
Table 2 Presence of women and men in European news as news subjects in different
news topics (in percentages, %)
As shown in Table 2, women are shown most often in relation to Science and Health (36%), and Social and Legal topics (31%). Men are represented most in Politics and Government (79%) as well as Economy (78%). For this thesis, I will be using the same classification of topics. So besides the topic of the actual reportage, for example: the economic crisis, I will choose in which of the following categories the reportage can be categorized (Politics & Government; Economy; Science & Health; Social and Legal; Crime & Violence; Celebrity, Arts & Media, Sports, Others).
The second element in the codebook will focus on ‘frequency’. For this, I will be monitoring how often a man of a woman appears on the screen and how long they are speaking (speech time). This will be times with a stopwatch and noted down in seconds in de codebook.
The third element of the codebook will focus on the ‘setting’. A description is given of the setting in which the subject is positioned. Here, a detailed description will be given of where the subject is positioned. For example, in an office, at home, in the kitchen, outside. It will not be about small details, but it has to be clear in what kind of setting the subject is filmed. By noting down clearly where the subjects are filmed it is possible to monitor if they are in a public or private setting and which these settings are.
The last element will be focusing on the camera techniques. For this, it will be monitored what frame is used to film the news subject (extra long shot, long shot, knee shot, medium shot, medium close up, big close-up). The details of these frames are described in detail in attachment 2.
4.5 INTERVIEWS WITH THE EDITORS
To give extra insight in the context of the TV-programs interviews will be done with two editors of a current affairs TV-program. This will give insight in how gender representation plays a role in their daily job. Interviews make it possible to
understand the patterns, stereotypes and tacit knowledge of professionals (Palacios & Díaz-Noci, 2009:110). For this study, a male and a female editor were interviewed who both work at the Dutch current affairs TV-program EenVandaag.
The main aim of the interviews is to get information about the choices of the editors: Does gender play a role in their decisions? Why or why not? Is it a topic that is discussed a lot in the process of making a journalistic production?
In the field of journalism studies, this is a qualitative approach and this is used in the majority of studies on professional profiles and the routines of journalists (Palacios & Díaz-Noci, 2009:107). For this thesis, the interviews will be semi-structured. This means that interviews are composed of a combination of open and closed questions. This structure is chosen because it will give the interviewer control, but it will also provide freedom for both the interviewee and the interviewer to ask deeper questions about interesting topics (Palacios & Díaz-Noci, 2009). This type of interview can provide reliable, comparable qualitative data, because a clear set of instructions is used (Cohen & Crabtree, 2006).
Cohen and Crabtree (2006) have developed a qualitative research guideline and state that with semi-structured interviews, an ‘interview guide’ must be developed. This guide must consist of a list of topics or questions that need to be discussed during the conversation. This allows the interviewer to follow topical trajectories but it also gives space for elaboration on interesting element of the conversation.
For this thesis a topic list is developed (see attachment 3). The interviews will be done based on that topic list, which describes topics like work routines, gender on the work floor and the wider context. The interviews will be conducted face-to-face and in order to get as much information out of the interviews as possible, the conversations will be recorded and transcribed for analysis.
4.6 LIMITATIONS AND POSSIBLE PROBLEMS
There are some limitations for the above-described method. First of all, the TV-programs are not exactly the same, so this will have influence on the outcome on different levels. These levels are described below.
First of all, the initial plan was to take the exact same dates for the episodes of the different TV-programs, but I have already found out that this is not possible. For some of the TV-programs it is only possible to watch the show until one week ago. Therefore, it will not be possible to compare the episodes of the exact same dates. To solve this problem, I will make sure that the episodes chosen will be not 8 episodes in a row, but every time, there has to be at least one day between two episodes. I will clearly note down the dates in the codebook, so it will always be clear which show was used for the analysis.
episode, and content. To account for those variances, the descriptions of the TV-programs are given as well as the cultural and governmental contexts (see chapter 3). Thirdly, the observations that will be noted down will be subjective. The frequency and time of speech are easily controlled, as they are variables that can be measured by numbers. But the setting and camera technique are subjective observations. It is important to carefully fill in the codebook. By trying to make the codebook as structured as possible, I have tried to limit the influence of subjectivity. But the total elimination of subjectivity in observation is not possible.
Keeping these three elements in mind, I have tried to structure the codebook as such that it will generate results that will be as reliable as possible.
5. RESULTS
In order to get insight in how men and women are portrayed in the four current affairs TV-programs, a content analysis has been done. Through qualitative and quantitative analysis, an insight can be given in the differences in representation between male and female news subjects. By looking at the four hypotheses, an answer can be found for the main question of this thesis: To what extent is there a
difference in gender representation in current affairs TV-programs in Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and Spain?
The programs that have been analysed are four current affairs TV-programs on the public channel in different countries: EenVandaag (NL), Aktuellt (SE), BBC Newsnight (UK) and Informe Semanal (ES). The results, which will be described below, have been generated on the basis of an extensive codebook, which has been tracked during the analysis of eight episodes per TV-program. In total 32 episodes have been analysed. The details of the analysis can be found in the codebook (see attachment 6). This codebook focused on three central elements: frequency, setting and camera techniques.
In this chapter, one by one the hypotheses will be elaborated upon. For the first hypothesis, it was expected that men appear more often on screen than women and men are speaking longer than women. For the second hypothesis it was expected that there are differences between male and female news subjects in setting (public or private) and topics. The third hypothesis is exploratory and looks into the differences between men and women in the way they are filmed. For the last hypothesis, it was expected that the bigger the gender gap in the country (based on the Gender Gap Report 2015), the bigger the difference in how men and women are portrayed. In the last part of this chapter, the interviews with the editors will be analysed, to give insight in the choices of the editors regarding gender representation.
5.1 HYPOTHESIS 1: Men appear more often on screen than women and men have more speech time than women
The first hypothesis focuses on the frequency of appearance of men and women in the current affairs TV-programs. It was expected that men would appear more often on screen than women, and that men are speaking longer than women. This hypothesis was based on previous research, which showed that women were underrepresented in news broadcasting (Len-Ríos et al. 2005; Vandeberghe 2014; Shor et al. 2015; Hust 2008; House of Lords 2015; Cunningham 2004; Byerely 2013; GMMP, 2010; GMMP, 2015).
Figure 1 show the proportions of men and women in the different TV-programs. As shown in the graph, Aktuellt (SE) has the most balanced amount of men and women. From the total amount of news subjects (n = 182) in the Swedish program, 57.1% is male and 42.9% is female.
Figure 1. Frequency of men and women in the different TV-programs
In BBC Newsnight (UK), from the total amount of news subjects (n = 84), 65.5% is male and 34.5% is female. Compared to the Swedish TV-program, BBC Newsnight shows 8.5% more male than female news subjects. Next, in EenVandaag (NL), 69.3% is male, compared to 30.7% female news subjects (n = 172). Slightly less balanced than the English BBC Newsnight.
The last TV-program, Informe Semanal (ES) shows the biggest difference in proportion of men and women. From the total amount of news subjects (n = 166), 72,3% is male and 27.7% is female. The difference between Informe Semanal (ES) and Aktuellt (SE) in representing women is 15.2%. This means that the Swedish Aktuellt shows 15.2% more women than the Spanish Informe Semanal.
In general, the results above show that men are shown more often as news subjects than women. This complies with the first part of the hypothesis, in which it was expected that men appear more often on screen than women.
In all TV-programs, the proportion of men is bigger than the proportion of women. When comparing the above-described results to the data of the Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP, 2015), some differences can be seen. The GMMP report (2015) shows that although women make up 51,4% of the worlds population, they are underrepresented in news broadcasting. Of the global average proportion of news subject, 24% is female and 76% is male (GMMP, 2015).
Remarkably, the TV-programs analysed for this thesis are all above that GMMP average. The Swedish Aktuellt, for example, shows 18.9% more female news subjects than the global average. Aktuellt (SE) shows the biggest difference with the global average, but the other TV-shows also show a reasonable difference - BBC Newsnight
(+10.5%), EenVandaag (+6.7%) and Informe Semanal (+3.7%). These results give insight in the first part of the hypothesis, in which it was expected that men appear more often on screen than women. For the second part of the hypothesis it was expected that men have longer speech time than women. In order to get insight in this, both the average speech time and the total speech time of all news subjects were timed.
The total speech time (in minutes) and average speech time (in seconds) of male and female news subject in the different current affairs TV-programs are shown in Figure 2 and Figure 3.
Figure 2 Total speech time (in minutes) of male and female news subject in the
different current affairs TV-programs of Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and Spain.
The results in Figure 2 show that women have less speech time than men in all TV-programs. The biggest difference in speech time for male en female news subjects is in Informe Semanal. Women have 52 minutes less speech time than men. Next, BBC Newsnight has the biggest difference: women speak 50 minutes less than men. In EenVandaag, the speech time of women is 37 minutes less than men. The smallest difference can be found in the Swedish Aktuellt, the difference in speech time is only 16 minutes.
The fact that women have less speech time is obviously directly related to the frequency of appearance. Therefore, the average speech time was also analysed, which was done by timing the length of a quote. As shown in Figure 3, for Aktuellt (SE) the average speech time (in seconds) is the same for men and women. For the Dutch TV-program, the quotes of the male news subjects are two seconds longer than those of the female. This is also shown in the BBC Newsnight results, where the difference in average speech time is five seconds. Lastly, for the Spanish Informe
Semanal, the average length of a quote is three seconds longer for men than for women.
Figure 3 Average speech time (in seconds) of male and female news subject in the
different current affairs TV-programs of Sweden, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom and Spain.
For the second part of the hypothesis it was expected that men have longer speech time than women. The above-described results show that for all the TV-programs of the different countries, in the total speech time, men have longer speech time than women. For the average speech time, with Aktuellt (SE) as exception, the quotes of male news subjects are longer than those of the female news subjects.
Besides frequency and the speech time, the setting and topics in which the subjects have been filmed has also been analysed. This will be described in the next section, which will give insight in the second hypothesis.
5.2 HYPOTHESIS 2: There are differences between male and female
news subjects in setting (public or private) and topics 3
For the second hypothesis, it was expected that there are differences between male and female news subjects in setting (public or private) and topics. Through a
qualitative analysis, an overview of the different settings in which men and women are filmed has been created. In de codebook (see attachment 6), these settings and topics were described and noted down.
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Based on GMMP 2015: Politics & Government, Economy, Science & Health, SocialThis section will therefore consist of two parts. Firstly, insight will be given in the differences in settings in which men and women are filmed. Secondly, a description will be given on the differences in topics for men and women.
5.2.1 SETTING
On the basis of the codebook, a qualitative analysis has been done to give insight in the differences in settings in which men and women are shown. These results will be described per TV-program. First, the results of Aktuellt (SE) will be described. Followed by EenVandaag (NL), BBC Newsnight (UK) and Informe Semanal (ES). Figure 4 gives an overview of the settings in which men and women are filmed in the Swedish Aktuellt.
Male - Aktuellt (SE) Female - Aktuellt (SE)
Figure 4. Graphs showing the settings in which men and women are filmed in
Aktuellt (SE) (in percentages).
The results in figure 4 show that most male news subjects are filmed outside or on the street (19%), at a press conference (14%), in a neutral setting (8%) or in an office (7%). These four settings are all, except for the neutral/undefined setting, proffesional and public settings. Only on the sixth place, the first private setting, ‘home’ (5%) is shown.
When looking at the female news subjects, it is clear that the press conference (19%) and the office (14%) are the most chosen settings. After that, women are shown most often in the street (12%) and at home (9%). These results show that women are aslo
