The Global Media Monitoring Project, GMMP is the largest and longest longitudinal study on gender in the world’s media. It is also the largest advocacy initiative in the world focused on changing the representation of women in the media. It is unique in involving participants ranging from grassroots community organisations to university students and from researchers to media practitioners, all of whom participate on a voluntary basis.
Every five years since 1995, GMMP research has monitored selected indicators of gender in news media, studying women’s presence in relation to men, gender bias and stereotyping in news media content. The fifth piece of research in the series was conducted in 2015 by hundreds of volunteers in 114 countries around the world. We are expecting 130+ countries for the 2020 research round. One of the core findings, in a nutshell, is that the disparity in gender representation is a universal phenomenon and that not that much has changed over the years or, indeed, decades.
The GMMP aims to advance gender equality in and through the media by gathering the evidence on disparities in the portrayal, representation, and voice of women in contrast to men. The evidence is applied to change unfair and unbalanced media treatment through policy advocacy, training, and public awareness. Underrepresentation of women results in an imbalanced picture of our world. Misrepresentation and gender stereotyping perpetuate inequality and discrimination against women.
* The Global Media Monitoring Project, GMMP – homepage
* GMMP2020: Monitoring methodology toolkit
* More information about the history of the global GMMP and about its first 15 years is available in the research article by two key scholars in the field, downloadable here: Ross, Karen & Carter, Cynthia (2011). Women and news: A long and winding road. Media, Culture & Society. 33:1148-1165