| This dissertation examines roles for females in the Beginning Independent Reading and Young Readers levels of the 1992 International Reading Association/Children's Book Council Children's Choices list. The books were analyzed using content analysis to answer four central questions about the presentation of females in children's picture books. First, what female models were presented in the books? Second, how has the presentation of females in roles, manner, and frequency changed over the years in the books for younger children? Third, what does the literature propose should be happening in children's books regarding female models in our society today? Fourth, what can be done to improve the female models given in the books?;All the characters in the forty-five books were coded by type of involvement in the story (main or secondary), age, sex, type of environment, behavior exhibited, types of consequences, and occupational roles. Frequencies and percentage for each category were the primary units for analysis of data.;Forty-six percent of the total characters were female, but females accounted for only 36 percent of the main characters whereas males accounted for 47 percent of the main characters. The character of undifferentiated, for which it was impossible to determine gender, accounted for 13 percent of the total characters. Females were shown more often involved in more activities than in past children's books, but males were still the more dominant characters in the books studied. The books in the 1992 Children's Choices show an improvement in the female presentation, but equality has not yet been reached between the sexes. |
