Women in the TV newsroom: An equal employment opportunity?

Women in the TV newsroom: An equal employment opportunity?

Equal employment opportunities for women are still a major issue in the U.S. society, even though equal rights and equal treatment are guaranteed constitutionally for everybody. The cry for equal right for women in the workplace has emerged heavily since the 1970s within the women’s liberation movement. According to a recentGallupsurvey, women still see a long way to go in order to achieve job equality between women and men. Only 43 percent of women “are very satisfied with their opportunities to succeed in life” (Saad 56). Additionally, only 32 percent of women say, “they believe men and women enjoy equal job opportunities in the United States” (57). Finally, “37 percent of women say they never feel discriminated against in … employment because they are women” (57). These numbers show major discontents of women with their job possibilities. Moreover, more and more women want to work. In 1974, 60 percent of women were satisfied with staying at home and taking care of the house and family; 36 percent wanted a job outside of home. In contrast, 45 percent wanted to stay at home and 53 percent wanted to work outside in 2001. These statistics reveal that equality for women in the United States’ world of work is not yet fulfilled.

A main and increasingly important employer in a growing information society is the media corporation. Although television is in hard competition with the internet, it is still the major and most used medium. The structure and format of television has changed significantly in the last five decades. Cable and satellite TV emerged in the 1980s; digital and pay per view television came up in the 1990s. Despite the changes and the success of CNN, one of the most important and most influencing show on network TV is still the news show. It is very important who writes and announces the news on the screen; since images of people and groups of people are heavily affected and shaped by what is shown on television. Therefore it is important to have a balanced and presentable diversity in the workforce of the television newsroom. The numbers of women TV journalists and anchors steadily increased in the last decades, but there is still gender inequality in career progress, salary, and image for women in TV newsrooms all over the country. The causes of this are rather wide, but many of them strongly relate to simply the gender of the employee.

The importance of TV news for television viewers declined over the decades. According to R. J. Donovan and R. Scherer, television news formed “the center of the political progress” in the early years of television (qtd. in Lont 219). About 80 percent of the TV audience watched the news in the 1960s. The popularity and supreme power of TV news began to decline in the 1980s. The ratings dropped to 57 percent in 1989 and news shows started to be unprofitable for broadcasting stations. Nevertheless, television news shows continue to be broadcasted in a widespread manner.

Despite the decline in ratings, TV news has kept their impact on their audience. First, news shape opinion and influence the behavior of their audience. B. C. Cohen states that news “may not be very successful in telling us what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling us what to think about” (qtd. in Bryan and Zillmann 4). Journalists have a significant role in this agenda-setting process. They decide what news is going to be reported, next they evaluate the message, and finally they determine how much attention the news will have and how short or long it is going to be. Therefore, news assess’ what people should be conscious of in the world.

Moreover, television is part of everyday life for everyone in the U.S. society. The existence of the TV is taking for granted. The TV set is like a piece of furniture, which tells stories. Television is part of the socialization process, also for people who do not own a TV set, because everybody grows up and shares the same—television influenced—environment. According to George Gerbner et. al., television creates and maintains a constant interaction with the public:

Television neither simply creates nor reflects images, opinions, and beliefs. Rather, it is an integral aspect of a dynamic process. Institutional needs and objectives influence the creation and distribution of mass-produced messages which create, fit into, exploit, and sustain the needs, values, and ideologies of mass publics. These publics, in turn, acquire distinct identities as publics partly through exposure to the ongoing flow of messages. (qtd. in Bryan and Zillmann 23)

Additionally, Nancy Signorielli and Susan Kahlenberg remark, that “television cultivates a common world view and common stereotypes through a relatively restrictive set of programs, images, and messages” (7). This cultivation process indicates what powerful impact the messages communicated by television might have. Hence, the combination of the strong impact of news through the agenda-setting process and television, due to the cultivation process, still has a tremendously significant influence on U.S. society. It is now to analyze the implications and effects of the power of TV news on the portrayal of women in TV news reports as well as the differences in image and status of female and male newscasters.

Women are shown less in television news and their portrayal is rather one-sided. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights examined news in 1977. At that time, only 2.4 percent of broadcasted news stories related to women or minorities. Another study from 1989 found out that only 13.7 percent of ABC’s news stories, 10.2 percent of CBS’s, and 8.9 percent of NBC’s stories focused on women. Lont remarks the rising numbers of the visibility of women, but also the really small numbers, which indicate a high possibility that there is still a lack of news stories focusing on women nowadays. Furthermore, the study of 1977 reports that only 2 women appeared as government officials, 3 women appeared as wives in the category “public figure,” and women as private citizens were mostly portrayed as victims. In terms of importance, the 1994 study found out that 76 percent of those interviewed in the network news were male (Lont 221). These numbers are explicit; they present a traditionally clear gap between the news coverage of women and men. Besides the visibility and portrayal of women in the news content, there are also differences in visibility and image of the newscaster.

The number of women as newscasters increased steadily since the 1970s; regardless, men are still more visible in TV news. According to Joe Foote the first female anchors, like Pauline Frederick, Liz Trotta, and Barbara Walters, got hired in the 1950s and 1960s. Foote indicates as well that during the 1970s and 1980s more and more women were hired in television newsrooms, but “although women were increasingly being hired as correspondents, their overall visibility on the evening news—the flagship broadcast—was low” (Lont 230). In his 1992 survey, Foote found out that from 1983 until 1992 the visibility of male newscasters was on an average of 83 percent, as of female anchors it was solely 17 percent. TheMedia Report to Womenpresents similar numbers:

On the three main U.S. broadcast networks, 87% of sound bites provided by experts were provided by men (1998); at the major TV networks (ABC, CBS, NBC), women made up 32% of the correspondent pool and reported just 26% of the stories in 1999. These numbers obviously declare a tremendously immense discrepancy in the visibility of women as newscaster. As mentions earlier, more women were hired in network news, but their time on air remains on a low level. Thus there must be a difference between a female and male anchor.

The newscaster has a significant role in the communication of the news. The newscaster is the star of the news show. This role of the newscaster has begun to be promoted extensively in the 1970s. News journalism became more and more to show business, as Ron Powers remarks. The newscaster’s role was not solely to inform the audience by announcing the news, but also to serve as a salesman in attracting as much viewers as possible in order to attract more advertisements and thus more money. It became increasingly important that the news anchor personalizes the news to raise the viewer’s identification with the newscaster; “to personify a shared viewers fantasy, a collective need” (Powers 2). Engstrom and Ferri state as well that “news anchors hold a prominence in the broadcasting profession due to their visibility in the public eye” (615). The newscaster should become a star, a celebrity. Interestingly enough, Powers mentions exclusively men in his list of important figures. He refers to “anchormen, weathermen, … showmanship, and … newsman” (2). Women seem to be not even in consideration.

Women have a different account as newscaster than men. L. F. Rankow and K. Kranich found out that women television journalists are more likely to cover news about “human interest, [and] lifestyle” while men cover more “serious, important news” (qtd. in Engstrom and Ferri 615). Hence, the men domain focuses more on political and economical issues, which are considered as more important—“hard news”—by the public, whereas women get stuck with the “soft news” including social and lifestyle topics. Societal expectations seem to be coherent with this division of news coverage. The stereotype of women in society is still a warm, emotional, vulnerable, and thus softer than the male stereotype. The consequences for a female anchor are, for example, the lack of credibility to the audience, or as David Hosley and Gayle Yamada mention:

[Earlier in TV news] women’s voices did not carry authority and therefore women should not deliver the news. Today that notion has been largely discredited, but now women in television news are dealing with the question of ageing (x).

These differences have a major effect on the television audience and thus society in general. As the cultivation theory states, the messages communicated by TV interact with the public. Stereotypes in society about women get reinforced through TV news and influence—even strengthen—the existing stereotypes even more. As mentioned above, Hosley and Yamada name the increasing age factor for female newscasters. More generally spoken, the appearance of news anchors plays an extremely important role. According to Philip Cook, Douglas Gomery, and Lawrence W. Lichty, television stations are convinced “that particular TV personalities help to build viewer loyalty” (xvi). Due to this persuasion, it is important for them to have “hot” TV newscasters.

The physical appearance of a television news anchor has to fulfill certain standards in order to get hired. In general, the physical appearance is a very significant factor in social interaction. It is the most obvious criterion in the first impression of a person. Without even talking to a person and without knowing the person at all, physical appearance provides already a direction for categorizing a person. There are existing features in the ranking of appearance into, for instance, beautiful and ugly. Moreover, there seems to be a correlation between a beautiful physical appearance and goodness. Melissa Ann Lavin and Thomas F. Cash notice that “research evidence indicates that children, teenagers, and adults may be initially perceived in accordance with a ‘what is beautiful is good’ stereotype” (52). Therefore it is much more convenient for TV stations to employ good-looking newscasters. The positive physical appearance alone enhances the credibility and thus also the quality of the news. According to Lavin and Cash, gender plays no significant role in the establishment of this stereotype.

Nevertheless, women as television newscaster face unequal treatment, because of gender differences in the assessment of physical appearance. Women receive much more pressure, due to their body image than men. Additionally, they are much harder judged by their physical appearance. A gender difference will be visible by examining one of the effects of this discriminative treatment: “In American society, approximately one half of women and at least one fourth of men are discontent with their overall appearance” (Lavin and Cash 52). In fact, this is also true for women working as news anchor. According to Engstrom and Ferri, women in the newsroom feel that they receive a different treatment especially in terms of physical appearance. Engstrom and Ferri argue:

Women in our society are held to certain beauty standards; physical appearance plays a large part in how women’s worth is assessed. This holds especially true for women in TV news, who, in their attempts to gain credibility as journalists, have had to cope with societal expectations of appearance and beauty over the years. (615) In addition, it seems like the physical appearance of women is often of higher priority than working skills. In contrast, men do not have to pervade such high beauty standards. According to a 1986 study by Ferri and J. Keller about the career perceptions of female newscaster, “the respondents noted that they are often judged by their appearance while their male counterparts are judged more for their work skills” (qtd. in Engstrom and Ferri 617). This discriminative treatment could be traced back to deeply rooted stereotypes of how a “lady” should behave and act in society. Ladies are supposed to look good and represent the family on the side of her husband; their knowledge of important issues, like politics or economics, is not relevant.

There is another implication the double standard of physical appearance could have. Lavin and Cash mention that “Stice and Shaw (1994) and Heinberg and Thompson (1995) demonstrated experimentally that media-portrayed images of thinness and beauty can impair women’s body satisfaction and mood” (56). Hence, it could simply be that women—half of the TV audience— actually do not want to see good-looking female newscasters on the screen, since it would put them into a bad mood. Nevertheless, this is certainly not a main factor for less visibility and different career perspectives of women in the TV newsroom.

As shown above, women are treated discriminative with regard to physical appearance as television newscaster, but there are also other spheres in the newsroom where women face discrimination. According to Engstrom and Ferri, overemphasis on physical appearance is the main career barrier amongst female anchors. For anchormen, however, the main obstacle is the lack of professional support groups. There are also demographic differences of female and male anchors. On average, female anchors are ten years younger than male anchors. Moreover, 31 percent of female newscasters are single, compared to 16 percent of their male counterparts. Finally, women anchors earn, on average, between $10-$20,000 less than men anchors. As mentioned earlier male employers still dominate the newsroom, particularly as newscaster. In addition there are much less women in higher positions, as theMedia Report to Womenreports, “[in the year 2000] women are only 24 percent of news directors at US television stations.” Marlene Sanders also presents interesting data from a 1997 survey: “Nineteen percent of all stories were filed and aired by women” and “story topics women covered were mostly arts, media, entertainment, sex and family, and federal elections” (55). All these heavily one-sided and discriminative statistics about women in the newsroom happen, despite, as showed by theMedia Report to Women, “women have been the majority of college journalism majors since 1977.” There is an increase in the number of employed women in the television newsroom, but it seems that many of these women work in hierarchically lower jobs—not as newscaster, editor, or in even higher positions. This could explain the proposition by Engstrom and Ferri that “in the U.S. half of all TV news reporters and anchors are women” (614). Maybe there is a parity of the raw employment numbers—even though this is in comparison to the other statistics highly doubtful— however, it could be that the vast majority of the women reporters and anchors work in lower positions or at less important TV stations. The few very active and successful women in television news are thus not reflecting a homogeneous staff in terms of equal visibility, responsibility, decision-making, and therefore power. This is still a problem in television newsrooms.

Managers of TV news shows are often attacked for their hiring practices. A 1977 report by the U.S. Civil Rights Commission names these unfair hiring policies “window dressing.” According to theEncarta World English Dictionarywindow dressing means a “deceptively appealing presentation: deceptively appealing presentation of something, intended to conceal flaws.” First, window dressing in television news for women means to be employed not due to skills and qualification, but rahter because of look and physical appearance. Second, through this employment practice TV newsrooms are blamed to dissimulate the unequal standing of women with some good-looking female newscaster. In order to illustrate window dressing on the set two examples of experienced TV newsroom women journalists follow.

First, Susan Kaufman interviewed Jennifer Schulze who became the TV news director at WGN in 1993. Schulze reports about her early years as a TV reporter. It was very hard for her in the beginning, because she lacked a support group and thus she did not get any help—especially in how and what make-up to put on, since there were only men on the set. Hence, Schulze experienced window dressing early:

I would show up as window dressing on the set at 5 and 10 o’clock every night on a story that I hadn’t reported. I would just do what they told me to. I didn’t know anything about television. And so I would sit there and I would deliver a story … But I hadn’t done any of the reporting on any of this stuff. But I was sitting there delivering it as another female on television. (Lont 244)

Another example is provided by Ron Powers. Stephanie Edwards was the co-anchor for the morning news show “AM America” at ABC until 1975. This news show was not successful and on air only for a short time—in fact, it was cancelled in late 1975. Stephanie Edwards complains about the fact that she was never told what her purpose was and what she actually has to do. Additionally, Edwards complains about features, which were written by men concerning women’s issues, like the women’s liberation movement. Those features, she states, “would have been better written by me, from my point of view, rather than by a writer whose words I was supposed to mouth” (Powers 144). Experienced women in television news therefore denounce the condition for women in TV newsrooms. The purpose of many women as news anchor seems to be to only present the news and look nice in the meantime—to “dress the TV window,” so to speak.

One significant reason for the ongoing inequality in television newsrooms is the persisting “old-boys network.” As stated before, men have traditionally dominated TV news. Because men have always occupied the high and powerful positions as well, it is still very hard for women to get into the important and leading positions. The institutionalized old-boys network is hard to challenge for women—why should men give up their predominant position anyway? Women had to struggle to achieve the improvements the made in the last 30 years and women will have to struggle more to reach equality in the TV newsroom. Sue Lafky describes the consequences of an old-boys network, “that affects job referrals and leads to the promotion of more men than women into management positions, and negative attitudes toward the competency and effectiveness of women broadcast journalists” (Lont 259). The results of Engstrom’s and Ferri’s study confirm this, because for men the main career obstacle is the lack of such a buddy system. On the other hand, the study also shows the importance of such a support group, since the lack of it is the second mentioned career obstacle for women. Therefore men have an important advantage, because of the already established and dominant old-boys network.

The role and impact of the newscaster in society is still very important. There are less female than male anchors on TV news and women television journalists still receive unequal treatment in the newsroom. The main feature of the discriminative treatment is the physical appearance and window dressing as one of its implications. This feature is embedded as stereotype in our society. Moreover, there is the old-boys network in TV stations, which reflects not only a male-dominated newsroom, but also a male-dominated world of work—as the numbers in theGallup Pollreveal as well. Due to those two deeply rooted and institutionalized factors, a broader movement in society is necessary for further improvements for women in the newsroom. Women have the right to enjoy the same opportunities, the same salary, the same credibility, and the same reputation in the newsroom—as well as everywhere else—as men.

Works Cited

Bryant, Jennings and Dolf Zillmann, eds. Perspectives on Media Effects. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1986.

Cook, Philip S., Douglas Gomery, and Lawrence W. Lichty, eds. The Future of News. Washington, D.C.: The Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1992.

Engstrom, Erika, and Anthony J. Ferri. “Looking Through a Gendered Lens: Local U.S. Television News Anchors’ Perceived Career Barriers” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 44.4 (2000): 614-34.

Foote, Joe S., ed. Live from the Trenches. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1998.

Hosley, David H., and Gayle K. Yamada. Hard News: Women in Broadcast Journalism. New York: Greenwood Press, 1987.

“Industry Statistics.” Media Report to Women. 16 November 2001. http://www.mediareporttowomen.com/statistics.htm.

Lavin, Melissa Ann, and Thomas F. Cash. “Effects of Exposure to Information About Appearance Stereotyping and Discrimination on Women’s Body Images” Journal of Eating Disorders 29.1 (2001): 51-8.

Lont, Cynthia M., eds. Women and Media: Content, Careers, and Criticism. Wadsworth: Belmont, 1995.

Powers, Ron. The Newscasters. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1977.

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Saad, Lydia. “Women See Room for Improvement in Job Equity.” The Gallup Poll Monthly. June 2001: 56-63.

Signorielli, Nancy, and Susan Kahlberg. “Television’s World of Work in the Nineties” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 45.1 (2001): 4-22.

“Window Dressing.” Encarta World English Dictionary. 18 November 2001. http://encarta.msn.com.