The picture book is the children's first contact with the world of literature. The aim of our study is to look at how children and adults are portrayed in the picture book, from a gender perspective. Our aim is to critically examine how girls and boys, men and women are presented when it comes to both characteristics and appearance. Our research also focuses on how the text and images complete each other and we conduct a qualitative text and image analysis. We use Nikolajevas (2000) analytical model for picture books and previous research that already exists within the subject.

In our paper we have clarified the concepts related to gender: gender, gender roles, gender equality and the picture book. We have also emphasized and described which gender patterns are found in each book. In order to obtain our results, we have examined three picture books that were published during the 2000s. Based on the analysis, we discovered that there are still stereotypical roles in the books. This also counts for the environment, clothes and accessories of the characters in the books. In all three books, however, we could also see some gender awareness and the willingness to question clear gender patterns.