Does Television Watching Increase Sexual Behavior Among Adolescents?

Theoretical Background and research questions/hypothesis: Sexuality on television depicts a highly glamorized and unrealistic view of sex. The entertainment industry is not usually attentive to the effect of its messages on teenagers, nor do they seem particularly interested that adolescents base their sexual cues and experiences on what is portrayed in the media. On average, adolescents watch three-four hours of television per day. Studies show that teenagers who are exposed to high levels of sexualized television are more likely to participate in sexual activity at earlier ages than those who do not view as much sexual content. The hypothesis tested are: does increased exposure to television influence early sexual debut and increase sexual activity among adolescents?  

Methods: This study uses data from the 2005 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) to test the association between television viewing and early sexual debut and increased sexual activity among adolescents. 

Results: Correlation exists between increased television watching and age of sexual debut/number of sexual partners. While results are statistically significant (alpha < .001) the strength of association (R-square = 0.0210, 0.0061, 0.0048) between variables for the three models tested is low, indicating additional factors causing adolescent sexual activity. A regression analysis was run by race and gender. When examining gender, the effect on sexual debut for each additional hour of television exposure had twice the effect on males than females (coefficients = -0.083 for females, -0.172 for males). The effect of television exposure on males was more than three and a half times the magnitude for females (coefficients =0.039 for females, 0.136 for males) for number of lifetime sexual partners and more than three times the magnitude for number of partners during last three months (coefficients =0.027 for females, 0.083 for males). Additional findings are also discussed for how certain racial subgroups are affected more by television exposure than other subgroups.

Conclusions: There are many factors influencing adolescent sexual behavior, television and media are one of them. According to this analysis, the sexual behavior of adolescent males is affected more by increased television exposure.

Implications for research and/or practice: Media has a powerful influence on the sexual behavior of adolescents, especially when consumed in large doses. Practitioners should be aware of this influence when designing health promotion programs that utilize media content to change behavior.