Little girls who play with Barbie dolls may be dampening their future career aspirations, a new study suggests.

It found that girls who play with the popular doll see fewer job options available to them compared to boys.

US researchers decided to carry out the study in response to the fact that some jobs are still very much viewed as men's or women's work and salaries are often influenced by gender.

They monitored 37 girls aged between four and seven. All were randomly assigned to play for five minutes with either a Doctor Barbie or Fashion Barbie doll, or with a Mrs Potato Head doll.

The girls were then shown pictures of 10 occupations. They were asked which of these occupations they thought they could do in the future and which they thought boys could do in the future.

The researchers found that the girls who played with the Barbie dolls felt they could do fewer jobs than boys in the future. This was irrespective of which Barbie doll they played with.

However, those who played with Mrs Potato Head felt they could do almost the same amount of jobs as boys in the future.

The researchers described the Barbie dolls as ‘sexualised' because of their unrealistic bodies, long full hair, and young and attractive faces. Both dolls were the exact same except for their clothing.

The researchers believe that it is the doll itself that affects the girls' views on occupations. This may be related to the doll's sexually mature body shape and appearance, they suggested.

They noted that the children's responses were in line with objectification theory - this suggests that females have a restricted sense of what is possible.

The results also support growing research which suggests that the idea of being female and not objectified or viewed as sexy is becoming an increasingly difficult concept for adult women to grasp. In other words, many feel that this is how they should be viewed.

The researchers, who described the findings as 'sobering', believe that playing with Barbie and similar dolls contributes to the early and inappropriate sexualisation of children.

"Perhaps Barbie can 'Be Anything' as the advertising for this doll suggests, but girls who play with her may not apply these possibilities to themselves. Something about the type of doll, not characteristics of the participants, causes the difference in career aspirations," they said.

Details of these findings are published in the journal, Sex Roles.