Gender and Racial Stereotypes in Popular Video Games

This is a study that I found over the summer based on both race and gender, offering some interesting insights into the subject. Written by Yi Mou and Wei Peng.


Highlighted quotes and facts from the study.

A recent NPD Group (2006) study reveals that 92% of children aged 2-17 play video games, and almost half of all "heavy gamers" are 6 to 17 years old.

A stereotype is a mental "shorthand which helps to convey ideas and images quickly and clearly" (Courtney and Whipple, 1983, p. 205)

Stereotypes serve multiple purposes in a variety of cognitive and motivational processes (Hilton & von Hippel, 1996).

In traditional media, gender and racial stereotypes are the most pervasive two. In mass media, compared to female characters, male characters appear more frequently, talk significantly more, and engage in noted behaviours more, such as achieving and showing leadership (Thompson & Zerbinos, 1995).

Exposure to these distorted images can have a negative effect on users' perception of women and minorities (Omi, 1989). For instance, women are usually perceived as subordinate and passive-dependent to men, with sexual relationships as central in life (Cantor, 1987).

Dietz's (1998) study was one of the earliest studies to examine stereotypical portrayals in video games. The content analysed both the portrayal of women and violence in a sample of 33 most popular Nintendo and Sega Genesis video games.

Not surprisingly, Dietz (1998) found that 41% of the games were devoid of female characters. Only 15% (5 out of 33) portrayed women as heroes or action characters, while 21% (7 out of 33) portrayed women as victims or as so called "damsels in distress". At the same time, in 28% of these games, women were portrayed as sex objects based upon physical appearance or sexually-oriented actions.

Beasley and Standley (2002) particularly focused on the appearance of female characters, using clothing as an indicator of sexuality... Beasley and Standley (2002) found a significant sex bias in female characters. Of the 597 characters coded, only 82 (13.74%) were women. A majority of the female characters wore clothing that exposed more skin than the male characters.

A follow up study by Downs and Smith (2005) demonstrated a similar result....Compared to male characters, females were more likely to be represented in a hypersexual way: being partially nude, featured with an unrealistic body image and shown wearing sexually revealing clothing and inappropriate attire.

Similarly, Haninger and Thompson (2004) found that in the sample of 81 teen-rated video games, women were significantly more likely to be depicted partially nude than men. In addition, there were much more male playable characters (72 out of the 81 games) than female playable characters (42 out of the 81 games).

Early content analysis studies consistently found that female heroes or female action characters were absent in video games. However, recently a new trend called "Lara Phenomenom" emerges, which refers to "the appearance of tough and competent female character in a dominant position" (Jansz and Martis, 2007, p.142)

Female features were exaggerated by sexy and attire and thin body.

Of the 19 games from the top 20 most popular games, five games (26.3%) were adventure games; five (26.3%) were action games; four (21.1%) were driving games; three (15.8%) were sports games; and two (10.5%) were role playing games. Two out of the 19 (10.5%) had no characters at all and both of them were driving games. Eleven out of the 19 (57.9%) had both male and female characters; while six out of the nineteen (31.6%) had no female characters at all. One third of the "E" and "T" rated games did not include female characters. Most of those games without females were sports, adventure or action games.

There was no leading female character across the sample.

More than one third of the supporting characters (43.3%) were female.

Chi square analysis revealed that females were more likely to be in the supporting role position than males. In addition, female characters were more likely to be portrayed as the rescued.

Among all the female characters in the trailer, over half of them, (58.3%) appeared unrealistically thin, and 25.0% wore partially revealing clothing. However, all but one male character in the trailers appeared with partially revealing attire, and most of them had a or normal or heavy body.

Females were more likely to appear with partially revealing clothes and unnaturally thin than males.

(Game characters on Covers)
In total, there were 26 human characters on the covers of the 19 games; 22 (84.6%) were males, while only 4 (15.4%) were females. The only four female characters appearing on the game covers were all unrealistically thin, and half of them wearing partially revealing attire such as bathing suits.

It is clear that gender was portrayed in an unequal way. Male characters, especially white male characters predominate in video games.

There is almost no female or minority character in leading role in popular video games.

Even though the proportion of female characters appearing in video games is increasing, female characters appear in stereotypical roles. Females are predominately supporting characters, who are either to be rescued or assistants to the leading male character.

The portrayal of female characters is consistent with the stereotypical mass media female characters.

The attire and body image of the female characters are often very sexy, with revealing attire and unnatural body (either very thin or very voluptuous). Yet male characters are portrayed in normal or masculinised way.

The representation and portrayal of female and minority characters might have significant impact on the players, especially adolescent players who are in the developing stage to form their self-identity, self-image, gender role perception, as well as their expectation of and attitude toward the other gender and other racial groups.

As a special type of media figure, game characters might also influence adolescent. As it is found that stereotypical gender roles are prevalent in games, it is very likely that this stereotype will influence how adolescent form their own identity and attitudes toward the opposite gender.

The weak, supporting role of females also instil the message that women are weaker and need help from men.

In the game industry, only 16% of the work force is female (Haines, 2004). The predominance of male characters in the video games also raises the concern that video games are made by males for males.

Girls hardly can find a female leading character as an avatar to represent themselves in the game, which might make girls lose interest in video games in the first place.

The disproportionate gender representation and the gender role stereotyping of game characters might be the reason why girls dislike video games and fewer girls than boys play video games (Hartmann and Klimmt, 2006).

Mou, Y. Peng, W., 2009. Gender and Racial Stereotypes in Popular Video Games [online] Available at: https://www.msu.edu/~pengwei/Mou%26Peng_gender%20and%20racial%20stereotype.pdf