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Although there have been a growing number of studies on the

representations of women and racial groups in advertisements in

recent decades, there has been a lack of research that looks at

both gender and race. This article therefore discusses the effect

of the depiction of racialized women in magazine advertisements

targeted toward adolescent girls, and the way these images

encourage stereotypes and warp social expectations. It

demonstrates that by repeatedly promoting a specificrepresentation of females of certain racial backgrounds,

magazines often imprint an illusion of reality and unreasonable

expectations on the impressionable minds of adolescent females.

In order to reach this conclusion, advertisements in three

teen fashion magazines were analyzed, employing Socialomparison Theory !women will compare themselves to an

unrealistic ideal" and #xpectancy Theory !society will have unfair

expectations of women based on these ads" in order to interpet

the significance of the results. Several factors were considered

when viewing the advertisements, the first being the

representational variable, which categorized the models in theracial backgrounds to which they appeared to belong. $ther

variables included beauty type, advertised product type, relative

importance of the model, and the social context in which they

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appeared % all of which allowed the study to see how racial

background pertained to the data collected of the other

variables.

&esults indicated that 'lack models in the American

periodicals were over(represented in comparison to their actual

representation in the anadian population, while #ast Asian

models were largely underrepresented. Instead, the ma)ority of

the advertisements were shown to feature *hite models in largepercentages of all types of advertisements. #ast Asian models

meanwhile were mainly shown in technology advertisements,

while 'lack models were prominent in advertisements for

clothing. Such data supports one of the original hypotheses that

product type would vary according to race. +oreover, these

conclusions are likely attributed to the *hite beauty ideal,-along with the stereotypes of 'lack women being hypersexual

and Asian women being intellectual yet anti(social.

*hile it is possible that the race of numerous models may not

have been identified accurately, the important point remains the

representation as interpreted by the reader, not the true identity

of the model. These representations often suggest to young

women a preconception of the roles they should play in society

and reinforce many adverse stereotypes. urther studies, with a

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broader sample size and scope, regarding the relationships

between race and advertising images should be done for the

prevention of increasingly distorted ideals and expectations for

female youth.