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Gender Wording In Advertising

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Specific wordings used within advertisements can also impact the appeals of what is being advertised to men and women. Chris Privet, along with other researchers from the Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, Princeton University, and the University of Waterloo, did research and discovered that “employment ads can signal whether a job is typically held by men or women… in the form of gendered words” (2011). After studying more than four thousand recent job postings, finding gender-based wording differences, recreating their own postings of identical job positions, and seeing how these differences would affect people’s responses, the researchers found that wording differences had an influence on the job's appeal despite the type of job it was. When more masculine wording was used, the traditionally female-dominated jobs became more appealing to men, and when more feminine wording was used, it made the traditionally male-dominated jobs more appealing to women (Privet, 2011). Gendered wording can affect what roles men and women choose to perform within society; creating limits to their beliefs in their abilities.
Quickly glancing at the advertisement from inside a Good Housekeeping magazine, one would not easily recognize it is an advertisement for irons. The Rowenta Iron and Garment Steamers advertisement portrays an irritated-looking mother ironing a pair of black pants for her nervous-looking son who is struggling to put on a tie in front of a mirror. The son’s current

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