Each December thousands of Swedish families sit down to watch the annual "Christmas calendar", a series containing 24 episodes. Since the start in 1960, the Swedish public service television company, Sveriges Television, have broadcast a Christmas calendar every year, and is now seen as a firm tradition, attracting audiences of all ages, though the main audience is children. Research has shown that children’s television programs to a certain extent have the same function as news journalism has in agenda setting. Media, together with feedback and interaction with other individuals, plays a big role in the process of socialization. Researchers have though not yet been able to show how much media and media content matters when it comes to shaping people's perception of the world and reality. Thus, we are now concentrating on how gender is depicted in children's programs, in our case the Christmas calendars. How are men and women depicted? What characteristics do the characters have? Does this change due to time? Are there parallels that can be drawn to society as a whole?

Our research resulted in ten overall analyses of Christmas calendars, picked from five decades, and five thorough analyses of episodes from these calendars.