This essay examines the communication value of music in television advertising. It studies different forms of music and whether these forms contribute positively or negatively to how television advertising is perceived and remembered. The forms are jingle, familiar song and unfamiliar song. 100 high school students participated in the study through a questionnaire.                       The study shows that music is an important tool that complements television advertisings visual aspects. Music creates feelings, emphasizes aspects of the image and clarifies the advertised message. The familiar song is perceived and remembered best and television advertising is best served by a familiar song because it carries different associations and meanings which the receiver can link as the song carries on to a brand or product. The essay concludes that all music is meaningful in television advertising, but that the choice of music form is crucial.

The population of male primary caregivers in the United States has risen dramatically within the past decade. Accompanying this trend is the evolution of fathers and their impact in the home. The modern dad is more involved in parenting and housework than in previous generations. Despite fathers’ growing role in the home, current depictions of dads on TV merely perpetuate the portrayal of dads as blundering and incompetent. Analysis of current depictions of mothers and fathers in TV ads and shows reveals the gap between today’s parenting reality and pop culture’s rendering of reality. Further exploration into the shifting parenting landscape and notions of masculinity yields a population of fathers who not only welcome increased responsibility at home, but also act as thought leaders and influencers in the parenting realm. By committing to the development of accurate and balanced depictions of dads on TV, marketers have the opportunity to harness this growing population’s influence and gain vocal and technologically savvy brand advocates. / text

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Educational Leadership / W. Franklin Spikes / Educators teaching English as a second language to adult students must keep course materials relevant, up-to-date and low cost. This research examines the possibility of using television commercials to supplement existing teaching materials, making lessons more culturally relevant. Often direct translations reveal that the translator, while knowing the rules of the language, did not fully understand the nuances of that language's culture. The idea that language and culture are interwoven is well established. While some understanding of one without the other is possible, finding ways to blend language and culture in the classroom can give non-native speakers an aid to understanding implied and literal meanings. This dissertation describes research on how American culture is intertwined in the ubiquitous television commercial and how these 30-second "slices of life" could benefit ESL education. It examines American concepts depicted in television advertisements on the four largest networks and then investigates the relative merits of using TV commercials as a teaching tool. This study uses the Map of Culture, developed by anthropologist Edward T. Hall in 1959, for content analysis of ten primary message systems that can categorize cultural descriptions. A sample of nearly 2,000 national television commercials was recorded from four major networks—ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC—during primetime in November 2001. Only national commercials aired more than six times that month were analyzed for trends in illustrating both manifest and latent cultural meanings, and even cultural taboos. Random examples were then selected to create a suite of ESL classroom materials. Television advertising was chosen for this study because of its accessibility and its ability to provide both visual and auditory content. Materials created for use in the classroom included a discussion model with pretest component, a video of selected commercials, a Q&A format follow-up discussion guide, and a post-test measurement instrument. ESL teachers and students who tested the materials and were surveyed on feasibility, logistics, students' interest level, content, and cultural relevance. Television commercials were found to include cultural content useful in ESL lessons and in class testing showed favorable outcomes. The study results could positively impact ESL pedagogy.

Thesis (M.Ed.)--Bowling Green State University, 2009. / Document formatted into pages; contains ix, 83 p. Includes bibliographical references.

The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on December 28, 2009) Thesis advisor: Dr. Glenn Leshner. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Central Florida, 2009. / Adviser: Denise DeLorme. Includes bibliographical references (p. 107-112).

Thesis (M.A.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of Communications, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 58-65).

A sample of 383 toy commercials aired on Nickelodeon Sverige were coded over the duration of two weeks concerning the type of toy, gender portrayal, number of children of both gender, the dominant kind of interaction, the dominant kind of setting and gender orientation. The results were then compared with findings from a previous study conducted in the United States that used the same method to determine a possible relationship between the way the commercials were designed and the two countries' levels of gender equality. In Sweden, the much more gender equal country according to Hofstede's dimension of masculinity/femininity, most commercials featured children of both gender and stereotype usage way more rare than in the United States where also most commercials only showed solely girls or solely boys. Judging from these findings a relationship could therefore be found.

Master of Science / Department of Journalism and Mass Communications / Robert W. Meeds / The advertising industry press has been writing about the increase in use of popular music in television commercials, yet there is little to no scholarly quantifiable data to support such press. This study investigates how popular music in television commercials is being utilized and how much is being used. A content analysis of 1,046 prime-time television commercials was conducted to further examine the use of popular music in television commercials and how its use related to observable executional variables in the manifest content. The study found that of the 574 unique commercials, 64% of the commercials used popular music. The results suggest that of the different types of music coded, popular music was in fact the most prominent. This musical prominence could be the result of the advertisers' mission to target the younger audience (18-39) and as such, use the music that is most popular among this age group. Implications for future advertising research and strategy are discussed.

Commercial advertising often employs stereotyping in order to connect with the intended audience and appeal to the widest possible demographic. The gender binary of male and female is one of the most popular audience segmentations, therefore gender provides an excellent example for the study of stereotypes. This study focuses on the portrayal of male stereotypes in advertising, and seeks to explore how stereotypes of masculinity are represented in androcentric advertising, and understand how these stereotypes are perceived by men. It uses a reception study and Stuart Hall’s (1996) theory of encoding/decoding to discuss the use of stereotypes with male University of Ottawa students, aged 18-25. Participants in the study suggest that the stereotypes portrayed in commercial advertising influence their masculinity in numerous ways, including, but not limited to, the way they dress and the way they act.