Assimilation as an impact of globalization: A comparative study of women's magazines in Singapore and the United States

This study primarily looks at women's magazines, examines the trends in readership and reasons for changes in content, and compares the magazine industry of Singapore and the U.S. Research for this paper was conducted through comparing qualitative data collected through numerous resources on related topics on magazines in Singapore and the U.S. Results show that readership, ownership, financial structure, problems, and content of the magazine industry are similar in these two countries. Nonetheless, the magazine industry in these two countries are economically, culturally, and politically different. It was also found that women were usually depicted in nonworking roles in advertisements and the portrayal of unrealistic images of women shown in them have a negative impact on the perception of beauty in women, especially those of Asian ethnicity. Even through there has been a steady growth of magazines in digital formats over the years, the possibility of them completely overtaking print magazines is still remote. Therefore, this study concludes that magazines are a form of media that should not be forgotten nor underestimated.