Sexuality and the media
American culture
• Sexuality is less accepted than violence
Why?
• Negative effects of sex
– However, violence certainly has its negative
effects
• “Puritan” morality
– More apparent than real
• Belief in the innocence of children
• “A TV network censored a sequence of
John Steinbeck’s The Red Pony, which
showed a mare giving birth, but broadcast
the rather hideous sequence from The
Godfather showing a beheaded horse.”
• “We now arrive at what turns out to be—
possibly through a kind of default—the
most pervasive and consistent influence
upon youth in the area of sexuality—the
mass media.”
– Internet campus
• “Each year, a typical teen-ager views nearly
15,000 sexual references, innuendoes and
jokes on television, of which fewer than 170
deal with abstinence, birth control, sexually
transmitted diseases or pregnancy.” (CNN)
Television exposes children to adult
behaviors, like sex. But it usually does not
show the risks and results of early sexual
activity. On TV, sexual activity is shown as
normal, fun, exciting, and without any risks.
Your child may copy what she sees on TV
in order to feel more grown up.
• (American Academy of Pediatrics)
Source: Alan
Guttmacher
Institute
Source: Alan Guttmacher Institute
Percentage of High School Students Who Ever Had Sexual
Intercourse, by Sex* and Race/Ethnicity,** 2007
100
80
Percent
66.5
60
47.8
45.9
52.0
49.8
43.7
40
20
0
Total
*M>F
** B > H > W
Female
Male
White
Black
National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 2007
Hispanic
Percentage of High School Students
Who Ever Had Intercourse, 1991-2007
%
56
54
52
50
48
%
46
44
42
40
1991
1993
1995
1997
1999
2001
2003
2005
2007
Percentage of High School Students Who Were Currently
Sexually Active,* by Sex and Race/Ethnicity,** 2007
100
Percent
80
60
46.0
40
37.4
35.0
35.6
34.3
32.9
Total
Female
Male
White
20
0
Black
Hispanic
* Had sexual intercourse with at least one person during the 3 months before the survey.
** B > H > W
National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 2007
Percentage of High School Students Who Were
Currently Sexually Active,* 1991 – 2007
100
80
60
1995
40
20
0
37.5
* Had sexual intercourse with at least one person during the 3 months before the survey.
1 Decreased 1991-2007, p < .05
National Youth Risk Behavior Surveys, 1991 – 2007
Percentage of High School Students Who Had
Sexual Intercourse for the First Time Before Age
13 Years, by Sex* and Race/Ethnicity,** 2007
100
Percent
80
60
40
16.3
20
10.1
7.1
8.2
4.4
4.0
0
Total
*M>F
** B > H > W
Female
Male
White
Black
National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 2007
Hispanic
Percentage of High School Students Who Used a Condom During
Last Sexual Intercourse,* by Sex** and Race/Ethnicity,*** 2007
100
80
68.5
Percent
61.5
60
67.3
61.4
59.7
54.9
40
20
0
Total
Female
Male
White
Black
Hispanic
* Among the 35.0% of students nationwide who had sexual intercourse with at least one person during the 3 months before
the survey.
** M > F
*** B > W
National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 2007
Source: Alan Guttmacher Institute
• According to a survey commissioned by
NBC News and People magazine, the vast
majority of 13- to 16-year-olds, 87%, report
that they have not had sexual intercourse,
and 73% report having not been sexually
intimate at all. Three quarters of them say
they have not because they feel they are too
young, and just as many say they have made
a conscious decision not to.
• The same survey found that, while only
27% of 13- to 16-year-olds had been
involved in intimate or sexual activity, 8%
had had a casual sexual relationship, which
has been described by one journalist as a
"profound shift in the culture of high school
dating and sex."
• In his book, Why Gender Matters,
researcher Leonard Sax states that teenage
sexual encounters are increasingly taking
place outside the context of romantic
relationships, in purely sexual "hookups."
• American media are thought to be the most
sexually suggestive in the Western
Hemisphere. The average American
adolescent will view nearly 14 000 sexual
references per year, yet only 165 of these
references deal with birth control, selfcontrol, abstinence, or the risk of pregnancy
or STDs.29,30
• In a recent content analysis, 56% of all
programs on American television were
found to contain sexual content. The socalled “family hour” of prime-time
television (8:00 to 9:00 pm) contains on
average more than 8 sexual incidents, which
is more than 4 times what it contained in
1976. Nearly one third of family-hour
shows contain sexual references, and the
incidence of vulgar language is also
increasing.
Teen sources of sex information:
(Time/CNN poll, 1998)
•
•
•
•
Friends 45%
TV
29%
Parents 7%
Sex Educ 3%
How often think about sex
70
60
50
40
Male
Female
30
20
10
0
Every day or
several times a day
A few times a
week or month
Less than once a
month or never
Source: Michael, Gagnon, Laumann, and Kolata
Percentage purchasing autoerotic
materials in past 12 months
25
20
15
10
5
0
X-rated movies or Visit club with Sexually explicit
videos
nude or semi-nude
books or
dancers
magazines
Men
Vibrators or
dildoes
Women
Other sex toys
Sex phone
numbers
Media depictions of sexuality
• Sexuality is common across all major media
• The sexuality exhibits certain tendencies
that do not reflect the physical world
• The characteristics of sexual content often
present potentially troubling moral and
behavioral implications
0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
Talk about sec
Behaviors
Intercourse
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
2001
2004
• Content analysis revealed that sexual content was frequent
and diverse. Prime-time soap operas and sitcoms led the
way with their scripted innuendo and sexual encounters.
Viewers were exposed to visual depictions and verbal
references to sexual content including partial nudity and
pixilated nudity, adultery, oral sex, masturbation,
pornography, anal sex, incest, and homosexuality.
• There were 677 sexual scenes or spoken sexual references,
or 3.76 per hour.
• Since 2000-2001, the incidence of sexual content has
increased by 22.1%.
•
•
•
•
•
•
114 of 208 episodes contained sexual content, or 54.8%.
CW had the least sexual content with 1.51 instances per hour.
ABC had the most sexual content with 5.97 instances per hour.
24 (Fox) and Standoff (Fox) were the cleanest scripted series, with no sexual
content.
The War at Home (Fox) had the most sexual content with 33 instances per
hour.
Scripted television had 5.13 instances of sexual content per hour, game shows
had 0.23, and unscripted shows had 1.48 per hour.
The nature of sex on TV
• Rarely explicit
• Innuendos are rampant
• Often occurs in humorous context
Who’s doing it?
• References to premarital and extramarital sexual
encounters outnumbered references to sex
between married couples by at least 6:1 (Greenberg &
Hofshire, 2000)
• In soap operas, as high as 24:1 for unmarried v.
married partners (Lowry & Towles, 1989)
• 32:1 in R-rated movies with teens (Greenberg et al.,
1993)
– Nudity occurred in all R-rated films in sample, with female nudity
outnumbering male nudity 4:1
Additional concerns
• Does the portrayal respect the characters?
– One of the most common portrayals in forensic
shows, pornography shows sexual violence
perpetrated against the woman
– Sitcoms are heavily laced with lewd comments
about women’s bodies, treatment of women as
sexual targets or men as inadequate
– Degrading treatment of women (and
occasionally men)
The effects of sexual content
Source: Rand
Arousal
• Men are typically more aroused than
women are, especially in response to
sexually violent or dehumanizing materials
– (Harris and Scott, 2002)
• Sexual violence may be especially arousing
to sex offenders and other violence-prone
men and even to “normal” men if the victim
is portrayed as being aroused by the assault
Men and women differ in their
response to sexual film
• Men and women usually differ in the intensity of
their self-reported sexual arousal to sexual film
clips, with women reporting lower levels. Also,
men and women commonly report different
emotional reactions to the presentation of sexual
stimuli: Men report more positive and women
more negative feelings.
• Men and women were presented with 20 short
film clips depicting heterosexual interactions. Half
of the clips were previously selected by women;
the other half by men.
Findings:
• Although overall, men and women differed in
sexual arousal to the sexual films, this difference
was most pronounced for the male-selected film
clips. Gender differences in arousal were small to
absent for the clips selected by women. Also, men
and women experienced higher levels of sexual
arousal to clips selected for individuals of their
own gender.
Arousal
• The degree of arousal is not highly
correlated to the degree of explicitness of
the media
– Sometimes cutting away and allowing the
individual to fill in the details with his/her own
ideas is more arousing than witnessing explicit
portrayals
Effects of exposure to weekly
pornographic films
• Less satisfaction with the affection, physical appearance,
sexual curiosity, and sexual performance of their real-life
partners.
• Saw sex without emotional involvement as being relatively
more important than did the control group. They also
showed greater acceptance of premarital and extramarital
sex and placed lesser value on marriage and monogamy.
• Less desire to have children and greater acceptance of male
dominance and female submission.
– Zillman & Bryant, 1988
Male attitudes toward sexual
violence
• Between 25 and 57% of college men
reported that they might rape if they were
sure they would not get caught.
– (Check, 1985; Malamuth, Haber & Feshbach,
1980)
• Consumption of violent pornography, but
not nonviolent pornography, predicted selfrated likelihood to rape (Demare et al.,
1988).
Availability of pornography and
sexual violence
• Research results are inconsistent
• High rates of availability of pornography
and sexual depictions in Netherlands, Japan
even though sexual violence levels there are
very low
• Predicted pattern shows up elsewhere
Context
• Cultural context affects response to
identical portrayals
– National Geographic and bare breasts
• Expectations in addressing the text
• Conditions of exposure
– With your friends, children, spouse
Portrayal of victims of sexual
assault
• Malamuth (1984) found that men who viewed
scenes of violent pornography showed a more
callous attitude toward rape and women in
general, especially if the women victims in the
film were portrayed as coming to orgasm as the
result.
• Men, though not women, were more aroused by a
rape scene than a consenting sex scene, but only if
the victim was shown as enjoying the rape and
coming to orgasm. The men were not aroused if
the woman was shown to be terrorized.
Exposure to pornography
• Exposure to pornography (especially violent
pornography) tends to lead to acceptance of
rape myths
– (Allen, Emmers, Gebhardt, and Giery, 1995)
• Participants with repeated exposure to
sexually explicit media recommended
shorter prison terms for rapists (Zillman &
Bryant, 1984)
Slasher films
• College men shown one slasher film per day for a
week
– Filled out questionnaires evaluating the day’s film and
some personality measures
• Over the week the men became less depressed,
less annoyed, and less anxious in response to the
films. The films were gradually rated as more
enjoyable, humorous, and socially meaningful.
They were seen as progressively less violent,
offensive, and degrading to women. The violent
episodes in general and rape scenes in particular
were rated as less frequent.
Follow-up
• The participants in the slasher movie experiment
later observed a rape trial. They rated the victim
as less physically and emotionally injured than did
a control group. (Linz et al., 1984)
• A similar study found that portrayals of a man
raped by a man (Deliverance) and of a woman
raped by a man (Straw Dogs) led to
desensitization toward a female rape victim at trial
among men exposed to the depictions but not to
women. Exposure to depictions of male
aggression toward men and women (Die Hard 2)
and to a nonaggressive action film (Days of
Thunder) did not have the same effect.
Source: Bleakley et al.
• Brand recall was 17% higher for participants who
watched a "neutral" program than for those who
saw a violent show. And recall was 21% higher
for viewers watching neutral shows versus a
highly sexual program.
• What if you juice up the ads with sex and
violence? Well, Bushman and Bonacci thought of
that and found that it didn't seem to change the
results. The violent ads were 20% less memorable
and the sexy ones 18% less memorable than the
neutral ads.
Feminist debate
Feminist debate
• Anti-pornography feminists argue that
pornography is misogynist and
demonstrates and encourages male power
over women
• Pro-erotica feminists argue that sexual
depictions need not privilege male power
and can be liberating for women, whose
sexuality has been controlled and treated as
secondary to men’s
Female chauvinist pigs (Ariel
Levy)
Where is romance?
• Romance is actually quite a bit more
common than hard-core sexuality in popular
culture. The question now is whether
sexuality is supportive of, detached from, or
detrimental to the development of personal
caring and love. Popular culture seems to
say that sex and love are in opposition, as
boys/men seek the former at the expense of
the latter and girls/women do the opposite.
Is the situation really so gendercoded?
• Most research on teens reveals more interest
in and curiosity about sex among girls and
more interest in real caring among boys
than we would expect from popular
portrayals.
• A second concern arises from the peer
pressure teens say they feel with regard to
sex, even though half or more likely have
not yet had sex.
Do we make sex itself
less enjoyable?
• It is possible that because our expectations
are based on unrealistic portrayals of wildly
orgiastic unions carried out in incredibly
gymnastic and beautifully orchestrated
ways that we feel inadequate when it
doesn’t come off that way. The research
shows that those who watch a lot of porn
find their real-life partners less appealing
and are less satisfied with their love lives.
Do we discourage long-term
commitment?
• Constant portrayal of extramarital affairs in
popular culture may influence our
subjective norm. Portrayal of wild sex and
the idea that that is the main source of
happiness in a union could lead us to
unreasonable expectations and to lack
appreciation for the non-sexual in a
relationship.