Advertising appeals and gender images in 'Shishang · Cosmopolitan' and 'Shishang · Esquire': A longitudinal and cross-cultural analysis

This study examines the use of advertising appeals and presentation of gender images in ads in Shishang • Cosmopolitan and Shishang • Esquire magazines, published in China, comparing them to their U.S. counterparts and to each other. By focusing on the changes since the copyright cooperation between Trends Magazines and Hearst began in the late 1990s, this dissertation explores the impact of culture on magazine advertising in a global setting.;Four issues of each magazine were randomly selected from each quarter, yielding 2,299 full-page advertisements for a quantitative content analysis. The advertising appeals that were coded include group, hard sell/soft sell, modernity/traditional, nature relations, and sex appeals; while model images were coded for model age, ethnicity, gender, beauty type, body exposure, gaze direction and setting.;Results show that ads in Shishang • Cosmopolitan and Shishang • Esquire differed from their U.S. counterparts in their use of advertising appeals. The mixed use of Western and Eastern appeals was found in the two Chinese magazines. Results also show that in 2004 the use of group, modernity/traditional, and sex appeals differed in Shishang • Cosmopolitan and U.S. Cosmopolitan, while the use of group, soft/hard sell, modernity/traditional, and nature appeals differed in Shishang • Esquire and U.S. Esquire . Both divergence and convergence of model image were found across editions. Ads in Shishang • Cosmopolitan have significantly increased their use of revealing models over time, while ads in U.S. Cosmopolitan have significantly increased their use of younger, sensual/sexy, and trendy models. Younger, female, and direct-gaze models dominate in both Cosmopolitans. Ads in Shishang • Esquire significantly increased their use of younger, cute/vivid, trendy, revealing models, and house/home, outdoor/leisure, fantasy settings over time, while ads in U.S. Esquire significantly increased their use of classic, sensual/sexy, trendy, and direct-gaze models, and house/home and fantasy settings.;This study indicates the central and intricate role of culture in the use of advertising appeals and presentation of gender image, and the diverse forms of glocalization. Global culture and local culture mediate each other in a complex way. The changed gender images in magazine ads are evidence of the dynamic construct of gender.