How does your posture line up?
Sponsor's posture chart: two dark silhouettes side by side, one slumped with a zig-zag line through head, back, hips and knees, one upright with a straight line, each beside a stack of orange blocks labelled with the faults (head drooping, shoulders rounded) or the corrections (head high, shoulders back). The slogan 'Straighten your line of balance' is followed by 'appearance, health, efficiency'. The technique is faint; the closest is card-stacking, in the one-sided before and after contrast.
Propaganda techniques used in this advertisement
- Date
- 1944
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- Samuel Higby Camp Institute for Better Posture
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Advertisement
- Issuer type
- Corporation
- Regime
- Roosevelt Administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Persuade or win support
- Themes
- Health, Home front
- Event
- World War II
- Regime
- Roosevelt administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44, World War II Posters, retrieved October 4, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (U.S. government work)
Samuel Higby Camp Institute for Better Posture. National Archives and Records Administration, RG 44, 44-PA-1008 (NAID 514534).
Text on the object
How Does Your POSTURE Line Up? HEAD DROOPING SHOULDERS ROUNDED CHEST SLUMPED BACK SWAYED IN ABDOMEN SAGGING HIPS TILTED FORWARD KNEES BENT FEET OUT OF LINE HEAD HIGH SHOULDERS BACK CHEST UP ABDOMEN UP AND IN LOWER BACK FLATTENED HIPS TILTED BACK KNEES STRAIGHT FEET PARALLEL STRAIGHTEN YOUR LINE OF BALANCE APPEARANCE • HEALTH • EFFICIENCY COPYRIGHT 1944 Created and issued by the SAMUEL HIGBY CAMP INSTITUTE FOR BETTER POSTURE Empire State Building, New York 1, N. Y., Founded by S. H. Camp & Co., Jackson, Mich. LITHO'D IN U. S. A.
