I. The Current State of Advertising, Gender Equality and Youth

Today’s children and youthFootnote ¹ are constantly exposed to a media deluge, fuelled by a globalized and ever-expanding media and information technology sector. The marketing and advertising industry has used this expansion in media platforms to more effectively target young consumers. Worldwide, 71 per cent of youth (aged 15–24 years) is online – the most connected age group – compared with 48 per cent of the total population, with regional variations.Footnote ² It is estimated that the amount spent globally on advertising targeting children in 2019 was US$4.3 billion – now one of the fastest-growing online audiences.Footnote ³

Evidence has shown that marketing and advertising are influential agents of gender socialization.Footnote ⁴ Children, in particular those under 12 years of age, are susceptible as their stage of development makes them less likely to be critical and more likely to believe advertising messaging to be true.Footnote ⁵ Advertisements frequently convey idealized notions of how children should behave in line with social norms or leverage sexist tropes, including the sexualization of girls and promotion of toxic masculinity, to convey product messaging.Footnote ⁶ This can put pressure on young people to embody unrealistic ideals that undermine their self-esteem, distract from meaningful pursuits, and justify bullying and violence. Gender socialization, beginning in early childhood, can lay the foundation for a lifelong trajectory of differential – and discriminatory – gendered outcomes across various dimensions such as health, education, employment and experiences of violence.Footnote ⁷ While the focus of this piece is on gender, it should be acknowledged that other harmful stereotypes, for example related to race, sexuality and disability, can also take the shape of multiple and/or intersectional discrimination.

In this piece, we focus on the relationship between gender representation in advertising and business and human rights (BHR). We explore the power of advertising to promote positive gender socialization. We do not question the existing advertising model or explore reducing the advertising that is targeted towards children – both of which require more in-depth analysis. Overall, we find that while there have been some positive developments in recent years with regard to progressive gender portrayals in advertising, these examples are limited. To promote systemic change, the advertising industry must be informed by global BHR standards, including by increasing consumer awareness and changing business practices.

II. Advertising and Gender Socialization

Gender socialization is the process by which individuals learn to ‘do gender’ by internalizing social norms related to their gender identity as they interact with key agents of socialization.Footnote ⁸ For example, gendered behaviour is learned by children when parents reinforce stereotypical roles and body ideals, such as complimenting girls on their looks and encouraging them to play inside with dolls, while praising boys for their strength and encouraging them to play outdoors. While not all social norms are negative, those that are can cause negative lifelong consequences. Media and advertising are key agents of socialization in the critical early years of development.Footnote ⁹ Promoting positive gender socialization through advertising implies that concrete steps are taken to ensure that children consume media that support positive, inclusive and diverse social norms, rather than perpetuating discriminatory gender stereotypes that reinforce harmful power dynamics.Footnote ¹⁰

Children’s media consumption is evolving rapidly. Research in the United States of America (USA) has shown that children and youth may see 13,000–30,000 advertisements yearly on television alone.Footnote ¹¹ As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, children’s daily lives have been increasingly pushed onlineFootnote ¹² and the necessity for online schooling in many countries means children use technology more than ever, increasing exposure to online advertising. Digital devices like smartphones are fuelling a ‘bedroom culture’ with online access becoming more private and less supervised.Footnote ¹³ This becomes potentially damaging because of children’s still evolving ability to discern fact from fiction, and their inclination to internalize what they consume.Footnote ¹⁴ Communication techniques in advertising – music, animation, humour, slogans, and celebrities – offer powerful role models and aspirational scenarios that can influence and sculpt the social rules for young people. While internet penetration and youth’s access to technology varies across the world, there has been rapid spread to new geographies and demographics, although research about the implications for children’s lives and development across all regions is limited.

Advertising tends to exploit gender stereotypes to sell products to particular target audiences. For example, the common emphasis on girls’ appearance, while underplaying traits such as intelligence, strength and leadership, creates unrealistic expectations that can be detrimental to girls’ self-esteem and sense of agency.Footnote ¹⁵ Boys tend to be subjected to narrow portrayals of masculinity that emphasize mental superiority, physical strength and emotional stoicism, which can reinforce imbalanced power relations and notions of dominance over females.Footnote ¹⁶ A 2019 analysis of advertisements submitted to Cannes Lions found that male characters outnumbered female characters two to one, had twice as much screen time and were more likely to be depicted as leaders compared with female characters.Footnote ¹⁷ Representation of non-binary gender identities are often limited or similarly stereotypical.

Online, algorithms that generate advertising, particularly on social media platforms, are often gender-biased,Footnote ¹⁸ leading to scenarios where, for example, watching content on diets can lead to a flurry of advertisements related to female body image and physical enhancement. For adolescents, with evolving identities and cognitive abilities, the physical and psychological impact of such intensive messaging can be overwhelming and can lead to serious social and mental health consequences.Footnote ¹⁹

While many businesses have committed to the Sustainable Development Goals (including Goal 5 on achieving gender equality), in reality only a fraction apply progressive policies.Footnote ²⁰ The common rationale for this lack of engagement is that the market is not ready for progressive content, although efforts are being made to address this perception.Footnote ²¹

III. The Drivers and Dynamics of Change: Human Rights Regulation and Markets

The 2019 Gender Guidance to the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs), calls upon states to address the differentiated impact of laws on women, including those relating to advertising.Footnote ²² Compliance with the UNGPs would require firms to ‘avoid promoting sexual stereotyping’.Footnote ²³ Clearly, a significant proportion of the advertising industry globally does not meet these expectations. The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has expressed concern about the impact that unregulated advertising can have on children.Footnote ²⁴ The Children’s Rights and Business Principles, developed by the Global Compact, UNICEF and Save the Children, in line with the UNGPs,Footnote ²⁵ with many private sector companies as signatories, call for marketing practices that ‘consider factors such as: children’s greater susceptibility to manipulation, and the effects of using unrealistic or sexualized body images and stereotypes’, and encourage ‘positive self-esteem’.Footnote ²⁶

The BHR framework is complemented by advocacy on ethical advertising to children and youth from international organizations, industry associations and national regulatory bodies. Industry coalitions such as the World Federation of Advertisers and the Unstereotype Alliance have developed industry guidelines and tools to prevent gender stereotyping.Footnote ²⁷

Yet, translation of the UNGPs into action is slow and lacks enforcement, partly due to business preference for self-regulation.Footnote ²⁸ Although not legally enforceably, European countries have some of the strongest frameworks to protect children from harmful advertising.Footnote ²⁹ In 2008, the European Parliament passed resolutions emphasizing ‘the need for positive examples (from a gender perspective) in the media and advertising world to show that change is possible and desirable’.Footnote ³⁰ In 2019, the United Kingdom’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) implemented new rules prohibiting harmful gender stereotypes. In the first year, two advertisements were banned due to gender stereotypes.Footnote ³¹

There is also a growing business case that shows promoting positive gender representation has improved brand effects. USA-based research on 50,000 advertisements across 14 countries found that those with favourable Gender Equality Measure (GEM) scores drove up purchase intent by 26 per cent among all consumers, and by 45 per cent among women, and boosted brand reputation by 10 per cent.Footnote ³² There are also numerous women-led industry initiatives to tackle gender stereotypes.Footnote ³³

There are some shifts: product aisles segmented by type of toy or child development level rather than gender;Footnote ³⁴ toys packaged in gender-neutral colours;Footnote ³⁵ or incentivizing companies through criteria for advertising awardsFootnote ³⁶ and celebrating diversity.Footnote ³⁷ However, these changes are too incremental to reverse generations of negative impact.

Cumulatively, this emphasizes the need for both regulatory approaches and changes in the industry to avoid discriminatory gender stereotypes and promote positive gender socialization in advertising.

IV. Looking Ahead

The following are some recommendations for harnessing the power of advertising to dismantle negative stereotypes and promote positive gender socialization.

First, systemic changes are required throughout the value chain. A stronger monitoring and regulatory environment is essential, especially across new media platforms. As part of the state duty to protect, states have the obligation to ensure advertising does not harm. There is also a need to support the growth of national advocacy groups and industry associations that can consistently pressure public and private actors to consider the link between children’s rights and advertising. Such changes will benefit from and be bolstered by more research on the impact of marketing and advertising on gender socialization among children and youth, especially beyond evidence gathered in the Global North.

Second, dismantling stereotypes in advertising requires an enabling environment. As part of exercising human rights due diligence, businesses should employ gender-responsive approaches to marketing, and seek gender parity in creative, production and distribution decision-making roles. The responsibility to respect human rights requires a move away from one-off campaigns to longer-term commitments reflected in policy changes that meet the human rights standards in the UNGPs. Multinational consumer goods and media/technology companies, as well as industry awards bodies, should lead advocacy as their reach and influence can be instrumental in driving world-wide social change. Professional institutes, particularly business and creative, should be encouraged to include mandatory training modules on gender equality, diversity and inclusion.

The UNGPs framework – with its focus on state obligations, business responsibilities and effective remedies – is key to addressing the discriminatory stereotypes sold through advertising and marketing. Promising practices are also emerging in the actions of businesses, the public sector and consumer organizations but more needs to be done. We stand at the threshold of a digital media explosion which has the potential to propel the next generation into an equal and empowering future.