Job Talk: Candidate Gender and Presentation of Prior Experience in Television Ads in the US

Abstract Does gender influence how candidates in the United States present their prior political experience to voters? Messaging one’s experience might demonstrate a history of power-seeking behavior, a gender role violation for women under traditional norms. As a result, men should be more likely to make experience-based appeals than women candidates. For evidence, we analyze the contents of 1,030 televised advertisements from 2018 state legislative candidates from the Wesleyan Media Project. We find that ads sponsored by experienced men are significantly more likely to highlight experience than ads sponsored by experienced women. However, we find that women’s and men’s ads are roughly equally likely to discuss work experience, suggesting that men’s greater emphasis on experience is limited to prior officeholding. The results contribute to our understanding of gender dynamics in political campaigns, the information available to voters, and how advertising shapes the criteria voters use to assess candidates.