Brief research reportGot yoga?: A longitudinal analysis of thematic content and models' appearance-related attributes in advertisements spanning four decades of Yoga Journal

- Presence of ads within Yoga Journal has increased over a 4-decade period.
- Recently, more ads for products, supplements, food, and apparel were featured.
- More ads for nutritional practices and meditation were featured in earlier years.
- Female ad models are now less diverse in age and race than in earlier years.
- Female ad model body size has changed over time in line with societal body ideals.

Yoga has become an increasingly common health practice among U.S. adults over the past decade. With this growth in popularity, yoga-related print media have been criticized for shifting away from yoga's traditional philosophies and promoting a thin, lean ideal physique representing the “yoga body.” The purpose of this study was to (a) analyze the presence and content of advertisements over the 40-year publication history of Yoga Journal magazine and (b) explore female advertisement models' socio-demographic and appearance-related attributes over time. Results suggested that Yoga Journal now contains significantly more advertisements for food, nutritional supplements, and apparel and fewer advertisements for meditation and nutritional practices than in its early years of publication. Models were more frequently rated as White and in their 20s and 30s in recent years of publication. Trends in model body size matched shifts in culturally dominant body ideals over time. Implications and future research directions are considered.