Industry | 2010.03.07
The big gender gap on the small screen
Study finds that females who do appear on television are often in soaps or on news to discuss \'softer\' topics
Although there are more females, by a head or two in every 100, than there are males in the British population, on television women are still a distinct minority. Only one woman appears on the small screen for every two men, according to a comprehensive study unveiled tomorrow.
The new research, commissioned by Channel 4 to mark International Women\'s Day , will also reveal that younger women are heavily over- represented by the broadcasting industry. Only four in every 10 women on screen are aged over 40. In contrast, however, for every 10 men featured on television, six are aged 40 or older.
By studying a sample period of 386 hours of peak viewing across BBC1, BBC2, ITV1, Channel 4, Five and Sky1, the analysis has uncovered that men now take up 65% of all possible broadcast roles. Although women were found to be well-represented in the soaps – where almost half of all the roles are for women – in light entertainment, comedy and drama they make up just four in every 10 participants. In the field of serious broadcasting, the research shows that women make up only one-third of participants in factual programming and even less in news, with only a 31% share of the limelight. When women do feature in news programmes, 69% of the time it\'s to discuss "softer" news topics, such as health, culture or cookery.
"This pilot research measures the gap between what we see in the real world, and what we see on TV, and is the first step in developing a comprehensive measurement of how well TV represents and portrays different groups on screen," said the former Labour MP, Oona King, Channel 4\'s head of diversity.
"Fundamentally, this is about how we view our world and which groups are hidden from view or significantly under-represented. The gender gap here is quite startling."
One of the clearest problems to emerge from this work carried out by the Communications Research Group under Dr Guy Cumberbatch was that, although women do hold down a fair share of major acting or presenting roles on television, they are markedly under-used in supporting roles.
To order to arrive at their findings, Cumberbatch and his team coded hours of programming, noting down all contributors, however major or minor, and then counting their appearances on screen. They found that women appear fairly infrequently as minor presenters, taking up only 31% of the possible work, and are only used as major contributors on factually based programmes in 34% of occasions. When it comes to general vox pops, women are canvassed for their opinion only a third as frequently as men.
The study also looked at the difference between the kind of news that is covered, "hard" or "soft", according to the genders used on screen. Men were much more likely to discuss harder items, such as politics, international affairs, science and the economy, while women were more likely to be asked to give their views on education, environment, cooking, health and culture.
Fictional programming, however, told a broadly different story with a higher representation of women, standing at 47%. Almost half of all the major roles in this category of broadcasting were taken by females.
In the light of this the research team were surprised to find that there was a much lower rate of women appearing in incidental roles, at 36%. The report for Channel 4 suggests that this "anomaly" could perhaps be most easily remedied.
The analysis comes to light as Sky News commits itself to a day of "women only" programming tomorrow. All strands of the broadcaster\'s programming, including bulletins, business, sport, and weather, will be presented by women. Their producers will also be women, as will the duty editors of Sky news radio and Sky news online. "There are already a lot of women on screen at Sky news – four of our five main strands include female presenters. Behind the cameras, we have a number of women on the team, but there\'s still some work to do," Kate McAndrew, executive producer at Sky news, told the Observer .
The research also follows speculation about the departure of long-standing GMTV news presenter Penny Smith last week. Smith, who has done the job for 17 years, said: "It\'s an ideal time for me to say goodbye to early mornings. Now that the format has changed, I have taken the plunge and am moving on."
The ITV morning show\'s website has been bombarded with complaints from Smith\'s fans this weekend, many of whom suspect she was forced out because she was now deemed to be too old.
For more information, please visit
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/mar/07/television-men-outnumber-women
