Yesterday’s Guardian had an article which indicates that the advertising world's reliance on young, white and extremely thin models has a detriment on company profit. A global survey of female consumers' attitudes, shows that women respond more favourably to a brand if the models it uses somehow mirror their own identities.

It’s not just a case of a few models that are say a size 16 (US size 12)but they need tor eflect age and background too. Ben Barry, from Cambridge University's Judge business school said "It's not necessarily enough to show one component which is similar - people really wanted to see someone who represents them in all three factors."

Such an approach has been used by a handful of brands in recent years, notably the Dove skincare range (see image above), which made a deliberate virtue of using older and larger models in its award-winning Campaign for Real Beauty. Elsewhere, however, the traditional reliance on so-called aspirational advertising has limited change, despite high-profile campaigns against perceived racism and the encouragement of unhealthy female physiques within modelling.

The study, which is still being completed, canvasses the opinions of 2,000 women in the UK, US, China, India, Canada, Brazil, Kenya and Jordan. Barry commissioned advertising agencies to produce a number of realistic print campaigns for products, including consumer and luxury goods. Half were made using what the study termed "traditionally attractive models" - aged 16 to 24, white and around US size zero, the equivalent of a UK size four - while the remainder pictured "realistically attractive models" of a range of ages, races and shapes.

The findings were marked. Aside from women aged under 25, who were less likely to object to an abundance of young, white, ultra-slim models, and Chinese consumers, who actively preferred them, most of those surveyed felt positive towards the brands that used the more diverse models.

A small number of earlier studies, mainly carried out by psychologists, have suggested that the use of excessively slim models can create a bad impression with female consumers. But Barry's work goes further: as well as looking at the issue from a business and marketing viewpoint, it additionally considers race and age. The latter is a particular factor for companies to take note of given the relatively high spending power of older women.

Another key finding was that while women preferred to see attainable images of beauty, this did not mean they were against glamour. "The women wanted models who looked like they were part of the fashion industry but also looked like them," Barry says. "It made them feel that they, too, were included in the industry and were considered beautiful. It's not just about taking a plain mugshot of a real woman. If you're a big fashion retailer and you're going to hire 10 models, you should make sure that each one of them represents a different aspect of your consumers."