Magazine Advertising in Sweden and the United States: Stable Patterns of Change, Variable Levels of Stability

Abstract

The article presents results from a longitudinal content analysis of advertising messages in Swedish magazines during the period 1935-80. Comparisons with similar data from the US show strong similarities and several patterns emerge. One pattern of similarity is variables which remain at the same level in each of the countries. This applies to two basic characteristics of the rhetoric, namely the level of information and the presence of non-rational persuasion. Another pattern shows stable distributions across time in both societies (for instance, women appear more frequently than men in adverts). Other variables exhibit similar patterns of change taking place at the same time (for instance, a growing absence of persons in the adverts beginning in the 1950s), while others change in the same way but at different times (changes in the US taking place 20-30 years earlier than in Sweden). The various patterns are assumed to reflect similarities and differences in economic, technological and cultural conditions.