comparative essay

How is the representation and content of Men’s Health magazine different to Women’s Health magazine?

Men’s Health magazine is aimed at men between the ages of 18 and 35 years old. In order to appeal to this target audience, the content needs to be modern and fitting to the interests of young men. Seeing as Men’s Health falls into the genre of health and fitness, the cover lines are relevant to health and fitness topics such as how to lose weight, gain muscle and dietary advice. The cover lines usually contain hash-sounding words such as ‘smash’, ‘ripped’ and ‘beat.’ This has been done to draw attention to the topics on the front cover and also so that the language being used is something that men who are interested in fitness may use in their everyday idiolect.

Similarly, Women’s Health magazine makes sure that their content is relevant to their target audience which is women aged between 18 and 35. For women, the content is mainly about weight loss and how to get the perfect body. Eye-catching language that has been used to appeal to the audience includes the words ‘sexy’ and ‘hot.’ These words are considered language associated with Laura Mulvey’s theory, The Male Gaze. This theory suggests that women are objectified and their feminine features such as breasts or legs are enhanced to satisfy a male audience. This theory has been applied in reality to the way that women want to look and the way that women want other women to look in terms of what would ‘sell’ and appeal to them in a marketing point of view for selling a health and fitness magazine for women whereas the content of Men’s Health magazine is tailored for the interests of a man.  

Another similarity of the two products is the representation shown in the salient image. The person used for the salient image on the front cover of Women’s Health magazine is typically a celebrity who is well-known for having a desirable figure or a celebrity who has recently lost weight or toned up their body to be more desirable. Women are also sometimes used on the front cover of Men’s Health magazine as well, but it is usually models standing in bikinis with a male celebrity. I think that this is done to appeal to men using The Male Gaze and is also done to appeal to men in a way that suggests that if they look like the man on the cover, they could get attractive women to surround them. Therefore, they would want to purchase the magazine so that they can obtain the tips that they would need to achieve this.

Sex is a feature used as a cover line on the front cover on both Men’s Health and Women’s Health magazine and this is because sex sells in terms of content. On every single cover of both magazines, there is articles in regards to ‘great sex’ or ‘what she wants’ and ‘what he wants’ depending on the magazine. Cover lines about sex bring the Health magazines into a crossover genre including lifestyle. Sex cover lines are represented differently on Men’s Health than they are on Women’s Health. I think that this is maybe because sex is something considered a taboo subject for women in some people’s opinions. Therefore, on the front cover of Men’s Health magazine, the line ‘Have great sex’ is more likely to be in bold, red lettering than it would be on Women’s Health magazine, where it is more likely to just fit into the general house style so that it doesn’t stand out as a sell-line.

From observation and research of several editions of both magazines, I can tell that Women’s Health has a more varied and colourful house style for their front cover than Men’s Health magazine has. I think that this is because men are known to be in a rush when they go shopping, therefore if they are looking for a magazine in particular they want to be able to pick it up quickly with no fuss and without the need to look for a long time. Also, there are less colours that are considered masculine that can fit effectively into a house style than there are colours that are considered feminine that can fit into a house style.

There is a crossover in genres that is especially shown on the covers of some editions of Men’s Health where the main content is about lifestyle rather than health and fitness. This is generally established when the salient image is of a person who is wearing a suit, for example one copy had Barack Obama on the cover and the main story was titled ‘Obama’s Plan.’
Other examples of main stories on these types of editions are ‘Steps to Success’ and ‘Reach Your Business Goals.’ I think that this is a good idea to make the content different every now and again but for a regular reader it could be off-putting to see that the regular content is different.

The aspect of weight loss and fitness regimes being ‘quick’ and ‘easy’ is a promotional tool that the magazines use in their cover lines. Some stories read ‘Strip away fat’ and ‘build a beach body’ which suggest that changing your body shape is easy and quick. When in reality it isn’t but if the magazine states that something is ‘easy’ on the cover, people will want to buy the magazine to read more into it.

To conclude, I think that both magazines have very similar features and content. The only main differences being the house-style, mainly in colours, and the way that the language has been used to market the content based on a female and male audience and also the salient image used on the front cover as I have discussed the effect of this in my essay.