A boy for every girl: Romance, relationships and sexuality in 'Girls' Life'

This study employs a qualitative content analysis of the magazine Girls' Life. Girls' Life has been on U.S. newsstands since 1994. The magazine's target audience.10- to 15-year-old girls--- is younger than other popular adolescent magazines. This new burgeoning market is often referred to as the "tween" segment. Through a qualitative content analysis of the editorial content of a one-year cycle of issues, messages related to sexuality, romance and relationships were examined. The study concludes that the magazine's editorial content promotes the importance of heterosexual relationships, stereotypes of male behaviors and celebrities as models for relationship behaviors. The editorial content examined also provided readers with very little information regards to sexual health or sexualities other than a heterosexual standard. The current study is limited by its examination of a single year's editorial cycle and the absence of focus groups or surveys of readers of Girls' Life.Keywords: magazines, adolescents, sexuality, romance, relationships, Girls' Life, feminism...