Stereotyped Traits and Sex Roles in Humorous Drawings

Abstract

Cartoons are used as indicators of the social meanings, especially personality traits and emotional states, typically assigned to men and women. Single-frame cartoons relevant to sex roles were randomly sampled at five-year intervals, beginning in 1952, from Saturday Evening Post, Saturday Review, and Playboy. Statistical trend analysis on 430 cartoon people in 195 cartoons reveals more trait stereotyping for females than for males. Five dominant, general stereotypes were found: the seductive female, the sexually assertive male, the disconsolate man, the incompetent woman, and the angry woman. There has been a decline in the occurrence of the angry woman stereotype and reciprocal sex role conflict in humorus drawings over the past two decades.Despite a long-term recognition of the information potential in humorous cartoons, few social researchers have taken advantage of these documents on human feelings and attitudes. Bogardus (1945) claims: &dquo;The sociology of the cartoon is found in the way the cartoonist can convey in stimulating ways the deeper meanings of social situations, social injustices, or social trends extending over long periods of time.&dquo; During the past three decades since Bogardus' assertion, investigation of cartoons, comics, and other popular humor has been largely psychological in focus (Berger, 1973;Legman, 1968;Streicher, 1974;Posner, 1975). (The few exceptions to this trend are reviewed in a later section.) The psychology of at UNIV OF MASSACHUSETTS on April 9, 2015

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