Gendered discussion of politicians in news : how can we prepare future female politicians for media gender bias?

Abstract

This research adds to the pre-existing knowledge of gender bias towards women in media. Through a focused review of political news media in British Columbia, this research found little evidence of gender bias towards women written in both municipal and provincial political news reporting. I conducted quantitative content analysis by reviewing 100 online articles during the calendar year 2014 from B.C. newspapers The Province and The Vancouver Sun, including comments in response to these articles posted online by the public, to find the frequency of gender biased language used to describe female and male politicians in these mediums. I also conducted three interviews of female politicians from British Columbia and analyzed them using qualitative content analysis. Both the online content and interview data were used to create a document tool, Appendix B, of best practices for female politicians to refer to when preparing and relaying their messages to the media. This was done to create better understanding of female gender bias so a more gender equal political news reporting environment can be created. My findings indicated a perceived gender bias in political news media reporting by the three interview subjects, but very little indication of gender bias in the political news reporting of major provincial newspapers in British Columbia. The results suggest gender bias was created more by the community and fellow politicians of British Columbia than print news media.