What is it about?
Our research looked at how race is portrayed in advertising over the past 66 years in the United States. We found that Black people tend to prefer ads with Black endorsers, while White people have started to prefer Black endorsers over White endorsers. The findings suggest that decreased Anti-Black prejudice and reduced ingroup identification among White Americans can explain this temporal shift.
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Why is it important?
The results over such a long time period reflect the evolving demographics of the United States and indicate the need of exploring underlying theoretical processes of intergroup behavior as well as implications for society.
Perspectives
Untangling the heterogeneous study results over time was really fulfilling, as no other study has examined the dynamics of interracial preferences over so many decades before. Advertising campaigns do not only reflect reality within a society, but also reach out to billions of consumers. Hence, our study provides the foundation for future research and marketing efforts, with particular attention to the demographic shift.
Julia Diana Lenk
Universitat Hamburg
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: White Americans’ preference for Black people in advertising has increased in the past 66 y: A meta-analysis, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, February 2024, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2307505121.
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