Another study conducted in 2010 focuses on female body image as a function of themes in rap music. This study is a content analysis. The study performed focused on whether female body images differ between specific messages or themes of the music videos. The videos where determined by the end of the year countdown aired in 2006 from MTV, BET, and VH1. These stations where picked because they are the most popular music outlets in the media. The results of the study showed that emphasis on materialism was at the top with 47.1%, sex was next with 45.2%, violence followed with 13.5%, and political awareness was last with 8.7%. The first main finding of the content analysis where that thin females were overrepresented compared to the real population. The second was that the body sizes of females differed as the functions of the videos differed.
Another study performed focused on the exposure to sexual hip-hop videos and their influence on the attitudes of college students. The study investigated short-term effects of exposure to hip-hop music videos with different degrees of sexual imagery. The experiment used 195 participants from a large Northwestern university, all undergraduates. There were 59 males and 136 females that participated. The participants viewed 5 hip hop videos of either high sexual content or low sexual content. The results concluded that male participants who were exposed to hip-hop videos with high sexual content showed greater objectification of women, sexual permissiveness, stereotypical gender attitudes, and the expectance of rape than those who were shown videos with low sexual content. The results founded for the female participants were mixed.
Another study was conducted and it focused on how women are portrayed in popular music today. It focuses on more discussion rather than a study. It uses the feminist approach for the method. The article goes on to discuss the multiple roles women typically play in music videos. Those include sexual beings, vulnerable and submissive, and worshiping men. Some songs’ lyrics discuss violence against women, controlling women, and sexually using women. It goes on to discuss the fact that despite the derogatory nature popular music has, women still listen to the music and actually support these artists by purchasing their CDs. The article focuses on one particular song titled “Right Round” by an artist named Flo Rida. The song came out in 2009 and was an instant hit. The song goes on to discuss the artist being hypnotized by a female stripper. The article does an in-depth critic of the lyrics of the song.
The view and aspects of women in music videos is obviously a very important topic. There has been a lot of research and articles done on the subject. The topic of women in the music industry is of great importance for many reasons. For many years, since music videos first came out, women have been used to enhance the videos. Even in the first music video to ever air, “Video Killed the Radio Star” by the Buggles, women were used in the video. As backup singers, there are two females featured throughout the video. One has on a modest dress, plain hair, and no makeup. You cannot see her body shape through the dress; it is not form-fitting. The other female standing next to her has on a pink dress with a high slit, makeup, and has her hair done with a bow in it. Throughout the video the female with the modest dress simply sings, while the other sings while dancing; moving her hips to the beat. For whatever reason, the director only wants one woman to be appealing to men. Maybe this is to make the video seem appropriate for all ages and family friendly, and yet still appeal to the young adult crowd. Since then, music videos have just gotten worse for the image given to women. Whatever the genre of music, women have been featured in the videos, usually as sexual objects to look at and lust after. Another example came out in 2009, titled “I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)” by Pitbull. The video first shows Pitbull, but throughout the entire video, just shows women dancing in skimpy clothes. All the women shown in the video are large breasted, either dancing alone, or dancing on the artist. Even when there are songs that are meant to be empowering to women, such as Beyoncé’s hit “Run the World (Girls)” there are still sexual elements. In the song Beyoncé is shown dancing in skimpy clothes, and men are seen lusting after to her. The message from the video is basically that despite having power and being strong, you are still a sex image and men will still lust after you.
The research done will be more specific to music videos and women being sexually exploited in them. Although studies have been done on this subject matter, this study will be the most popular videos of 2013, and will focus strictly on sexual imagery.
There were two testable hypotheses for the study done:
H1: Women are shown as sexual objects in more than half of 20 of the most popular music videos of today’s time.
H2: Music videos use women as props and to entice the audience.
Methodology
The study done was a content analysis that looked at popular music videos of 2013 and focused on the sexual exploitation of women in the videos. The videos used were from a popular website for music, VEVO. The study looked at the top 20 “Top Videos” of the website. There was a list of sexually explicit moments common in music videos such as women in skimpy clothes and women dancing seductively. There were fifteen different things the study listed to spot in each video. Every time one thing happened, it was be marked. At the end of the 20 videos the data was collected and calculated to be put into a percentile group.
A list of all the content that was looked for will be provided below.
- Women in skimpy clothing
- Women undressing
- Women artist yearning for male
- Women touching self
- Women touching other women
- Women artist crying or depressed
- Kissing between anyone
- Women dancing seductively alone
- Women dancing with other women seductively
- Women grinding on men
- Camera focuses in on breasts of women
- Camera focuses on buttocks
- Women licks lips or object seductively
- Women purse lips together or blows kiss
- Some type of liquid is poured on female
A list of the 20 music videos and artist used for the content analysis will be provided below.
- “Molly” by Tyga ft. Cedric Gervais, Wiz Khalifa, and Mally Mall
- “Play Hard” by David Guetta ft. Akon and Ne-yo
- “Just Give Me a Reason” by Pink ft. Nate Ruess
- “#thatPOWER” by will.i.am ft. Justin Beiber
- “Stay” by Rihanna ft. Mikky Ekko
- “Body Party” by Ciara
- “Heart Attack” by Demi Lavato
- “Scream & Shout” by will.i.am ft. Brittney Spears
- “Get Lucky” by Daft Punk ft. Pharrell
- “Feel This Moment” by Pitbull ft. Christina Aguilera
- “22” by Taylor Swift
- “Diamonds” by Rihanna
- “One Way or Another” by One Direction
- “Mirrors” by Justin Timberlake
- “Hurricane” by Bridget Mendler
- “Call Me Maybe” by Carly Rae Jepsen
- “The Way” by Ariana Grande ft. Mac Miller
- “Memories Back Then” by
- “Beauty and a Beat” by Justin Beiber ft. Nicki Minaj
- “I Need Your Love” by Calvin Harris ft. Ellie Goulding
The use of a content analysis had strengths. One strength being that it was in what data is being obtained and was easy to obtain. It was either there in the video or it is not. Content analysis is also strength as it is solid ground to build another study on using the results of the content analysis. The downfall of the study is that since the videos being used were simply the top 20 of this time period, not were sexually explicit.
Results
The two tables show the raw data collected from the content analysis. There were women in skimpy clothes in 65% of the 20 videos. In 20% of the videos there were women undressing. In 45% of the videos there was a female artist yearning for a male. There were women touching themselves in 50% of the videos. In 5% of the videos there were women touching other women. In 15% of the videos there was a female artist either crying or depressed. In 30% of the videos there was kissing between anyone. In 50% of the videos there were women dancing seductively alone. In 5% of the videos there were women dancing seductively with other women. There were women grinding on men in 25% of the videos. In 35% of the videos the camera focused in on breasts. Also in 35% of the videos the camera focused in on buttocks. In 25% of the videos there was a woman who either licked her licks or licked an object seductively. A woman pursed her lips together or blew a kiss in 35% of the videos. In 0% of the videos was there any type of liquid poured on a woman.
10% of the videos had none of the observations. 90% of the videos had at least one observation. 10% had only 1 observation. 15% had only 2 observations. 5% had 3 observations. Video #1 had nine observations. Video #2 had 6 observations in it. Video #3 had 7 observations. The fourth video had no observations. Video #5 had 6 observations in it. Video #6 had 8 observations. The seventh video has no observations in it. The eighth video had only 2 observations. Video #9 had 5 observations. The tenth video had only 4 observations. Video #11 had only two observations. The twelfth video had six observations. The thirteenth video had only one observation. Video #14 had 6 observations. The fifteenth video had only 1 observation. The next video, video #16 had only 2 observations. Video #17 had 7 observations. The eighteenth video had 3 observations. Video #19 had 5 observations. The last video, video #20 had eight observations.
With there only being two videos that had none of the observations, that leaves 18 with at least one. This proves H1, that at least half the videos would have sexual exploitation of women. Also these results support H2, that music videos use women as props and to entice the audience. The two videos with no observations in them were “#thatPOWER” by will.i.am and “Heart Attack” by Demi Lovato.
The “Heart Attack” video is by a single female artist, Demi Lovato. The entire video only features her and a backup band of males. Not once in the video is she shown in provocative clothing. The lyrics are about her falling for a guy and because of that she becomes defensive. It talked about her being able to easily interact with men when they do not mean anything to her but the male the song is directed to is different. Although the lyrics suggest she is at the will of a guy, the video is feminist in the sense that it does not degrade women in anyway. She is fully dressed throughout the video and not once does she do any provocative moves.
The second video with no observations in it is titled “#thatPOWER” by will.i.am ft. Justin Bieber. This video surprisingly has no women featured in it. The backup dancers are all men. The video is futuristic in its nature. The lyrics are about the artist will.i.am being “cool.” The video features will.i.am, Justin Bieber, and backup dancers.
The results found that in 18 of the videos, there was at least one thing done by women that sexually exploited them. There is something very wrong with today’s music videos. The majority of videos use women as sexual props. Some use women as just objects to be looked at and touched. Others show women alone and in need of a man, as if to say women need men in their lives to be complete. Some videos are too sexually explicit to be aired on television. There are even videos and lyrics that suggest violence against women. These videos give young men (the most impressible) very wrong ideas. These videos give men an unrealistic standard for women’s bodies. Almost 41 million women in the United States over 20 are obese ("Prevalence of obesity," 2012). The majority of women are not “perfect” looking. Women come in all shapes and sizes and should not be pressured to change their body. Not only does it put these unrealistic expectations in males’ heads, but it also gives the impression that women are only used for their bodies. The women shown in music videos are silent and only shine light on their bodies, not their minds. Women live in a world today where almost every aspect of society focuses on how they look. Music videos only reinforce this.
There are some videos that are unique by going against the norm of having women be sexually exploited in music videos. Like the two in the study, there are some videos that have no women dancing around or half naked. There are some songs that are feminist and some artist as well. The few videos that are out there like this give hope for the music industry. It women use their voices, there could be changes made. Women need to realize what is going on and realize how women are being used in music videos.
This content analysis could use improvements. The most important would be the details. Content analyses need to be very specific in what they are looking for, and very detailed in the observations. This content analysis could be good solid ground for another study to grow out of it. With a few changes, this content analysis could be replicated and be very successful. To improve the results a specific genre of music videos, such as rap, could have been used. A different popular music site could have also been used. With a few tweaks here in there in this content analysis it could be very successful.
Bibliography
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics. (2012). Prevalence of obesity in the united states, 2009–2010 (No. 82). Retrieved from DHHS Publication website: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db82.pdf
Hay, C. (2001). Would The Least Cliched Music Video Please Stand Up?. Billboard, 113(5), 90.
Kistler, M. E., & Lee, M. J. (2010). Does Exposure to Sexual Hip-Hop Music Videos Influence the Sexual Attitudes of College Students?. Mass Communication & Society, 13(1), 67-86.
Sprankle, E. L., End, C. M., & Bretz, M. N. (2012). Sexually degrading music videos and lyrics: Their effects on males’ aggression and endorsement of rape myths and sexual stereotypes. Journal Of Media Psychology: Theories, Methods, And Applications, 24(1), 31-39. doi:10.1027/1864-1105/a000060
Zhang, Y., Dixon, T. L., & Conrad, K. (2010). Female body image as a function of themes in rap music videos: A content analysis. Sex Roles, 62(11-12), 787-797. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11199-009-9656-y
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