Advertising has come out The effects of advertising’s portrayal of lesbian, gay, and transgender characters on viewers’ attitudes toward homosexuality and transgender identities

This study examined the effects of exposure to advertisements featuring lesbian, gay, and transgender characters on viewers’ attitudes toward homosexuality and transgender identities. Sexual minorities’ rising inclusion in advertising has attracted scholars’ and the news media’s attention, especially in Argentina, a country surrounded by more conservative media environments. Despite scholars’ attribution of cultivating effects to the mass media, research on LGBT-inclusive advertising has been limited to analyzing the ads’ content and commercial effectiveness. This study moved beyond the largely commercially-focused research on the topic, by assessing the extent to which exposure to advertisements portraying LGT characters change viewers’ attitudes toward these groups, comparing viewers’ attitudes toward ads with varying degrees of protagonism of LGT characters, and exploring the ways in which viewers evaluate LGT-inclusive ads and the trend toward LGT-inclusive advertising. By means of a mixed methods experimental design comprising closed- and open-ended questions, the study found no significant effect of exposure. Still, the results challenge ideas of advertising as having solely commercial effects as they reveal participants’ belief that advertising could lead to positive social changes by normalizing sexual minorities as an everyday reality. The study questions the explanations of viewers’ preference for ads with non-central LGBT portrayals as their refusal to be excluded from advertising. Instead, it suggests that this preference relates to viewers’ consideration that unforced representations where inclusion is not over-focused are more positive for sexual minorities. This study revealed that the emphasis placed on inclusion and how forced such inclusion results are important factors when evaluating an advertisement, whereas the specific LGT subgroup portrayed does not determine viewers’ attitudes toward the ads. By observing the nuances with which viewers evaluate advertising’s inclusive trend, this study challenges the ideas of advertising featuring sexual minorities as something that viewers either support or reject. Instead, it calls on both researchers and advertising practitioners to consider that attending to who is represented is insufficient, since audiences are often critical of the actual way in which those representations are done.