Researchers explore prominence of weight and race in Super Bowl ads

Thin is not always in when it comes to promoting food, drink, and other products during The Big Game, according to a new Yale study that examines weight and race in Super Bowl advertisements. Researchers viewed 241 TV commercials that aired from Super Bowl XLVI in 2012 through Super Bowl XLIX in 2015. Using a detailed coding scheme, they screened the actors for body size and racial and ethnic diversity. Their expectation was that very few overweight or obese actors would be cast in the commercials, and that food and beverage ads would be more likely to feature Black and Hispanic actors since the rate of obesity in the United States is higher in those two groups. Approximately 15 percent of commercials featured actors with overweight or obesity, and the actors with excess weight were primarily White, according to the study, which was published online September 22 in The International Journal of Clinical Practice. "This suggests a potential change in media portrayal of body-size norms, but also mischaracterizes the people who are more likely to have obesity," said Janet A. Lydecker, PhD, Associate Research Scientist in Psychiatry at Yale and the paper's first author. The representation of people with overweight in Super Bowl ads remains low given the prevalence of obesity in the U.S., but the authors said the use of some actors with overweight and obesity in commercials may signal a change in the media's portrayal of normal body size as being exclusively thin.