This has been ``a decade of progress for women on television'' _ especially for female characters in prime time _ but the industry must be monitored to ensure further gains, the National Commission on Working Women said. The accolade and note of caution came Tuesday as the commission released a report entitled ``Ten Years in Prime Time: An Analysis of the Image of Women on Entertainment Television, 1979-1988,'' which examined the portrayal of women and compared the fictional panorama with the profile of real-life women during the decade. ``The 1980s mark a decade of progress for women on television. Their portrayals have become more diverse and, for the most part, more true-to-life,'' the report said. ``... The networks get a pat on the back,'' said the study's author, Sally Streenland. The study said 60 percent of female characters on the 25 top Nielsen rated shows in 1979 were portrayed as employed outside the home. By 1987, that figure had risen to 75 percent. By comparison, 1987 population statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau show that 56 percent of all women were in the labor force. Streenland's study also showed TV painting an unrealistically rosy picture of the types of jobs held by women. In 1979, more than 40 percent of television's women were employed in clerical or service jobs. By 1987 only 23 percent of the women on TV had the lower skilled jobs and more than half had professional careers. The real life situation is that 47 percent of working women have clerical and service occupations and only 24 percent work in professional or managerial jobs. The report also showed that black women have become more visible on TV. In 1979 there was only one black female character on television, but by 1987, 22 percent of women characters were black.
