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Although mounting evidence in Western nations indicates that entertainment media influence young people’s sexual socialisation, virtually no research has addressed the topic in sub-Saharan Africa. The present study employed 14 focus groups of Ugandan high school students to identify media through which they were exposed to sexual content, how they interpreted and evaluated that content, and how they compared its influence with that of parents, schools and religious institutions. Participants most often mentioned TV, followed by print media and Internet as sources of sexual material. Media were said to present discrepant messages regarding the timing of sexual debut, with international programming urging early sexual debut and local programming described as urging young people to delay sex. Young people spoke of turning tossengasandkojjasfor sexual advice, and a number of boys suggested pornography could also be educational. Both local and international programming was interpreted as conveying views of men as sex driven and women as submissive in sex and relationships. Participants expressed the belief that sexual media content had a negative impact on young people. Most nevertheless assessed these messages as more influential than other sources of sexual socialisation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The goal of this two-part study was to identify the perceived influence of sexuality messages from parents, peers, school and the media – four microsystems within the Ecological Model – on emerging adult US college women's sexual attitudes. Findings suggest that parents were the most likely source of the message to ‘remain abstinent until marriage’, and participants reported this message as being more influential when coming from school than from the media. The school and the media were the most likely sources of the messages to ‘be safe and use protection’ and to ‘use birth control so you don't get pregnant’. College women reported that the message to ‘use protection’ influenced their sexual behaviour more, however, when it came from their parents than from school, and more when it came from school than from the media. These results have implications for future prevention programming. Specifically, with respect to these messages, and without generalising beyond these data, parents and school appear to be more influential than peers and the media, and thus should be leveraged in development of new sex education and safer sex programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Sexually explicit material (SEM) (including Internet, video, and print) may play a key role in the lives of Black same-sex sexually active youth by providing the only information to learn about sexual development. There is limited school- and/or family-based sex education to serve as models for sexual behaviors for Black youth. We describe the role SEM plays in the sexual development of a sample of Black same-sex attracted (SSA) young adolescent males ages 15-19. Adolescents recruited from clinics, social networking sites, and through snowball sampling were invited to participate in a 90-min, semi-structured qualitative interview. Most participants described using SEM prior to their first same-sex sexual experience. Participants described using SEM primarily for sexual development, including learning about sexual organs and function, the mechanics of same-gender sex, and to negotiate one's sexual identity. Secondary functions were to determine readiness for sex; to learn about sexual performance, including understanding sexual roles and responsibilities (e.g., 'top' or 'bottom'); to introduce sexual performance scripts; and to develop models for how sex should feel (e.g., pleasure and pain). Youth also described engaging in sexual behaviors (including condom non-use and/or swallowing ejaculate) that were modeled on SEM. Comprehensive sexuality education programs should be designed to address the unmet needs of young, Black SSA men, with explicit focus on sexual roles and behaviors that may be inaccurately portrayed and/or involve sexual risk-taking (such as unprotected anal intercourse and swallowing ejaculate) in SEM. This work also calls for development of Internet-based HIV/STI prevention strategies targeting young Black SSA men who may be accessing SEM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reducing new HIV/STD infections among at-risk adolescents requires developing and evaluating evidence-based health communication approaches. Research overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that early sexual initiation is associated with STDs and other negative outcomes in later years (e.g., unintended pregnancy). The authors' research group secured funding from the National Institute of Mental Health to develop, implement, and rigorously evaluate televised mass media campaigns to delay initiation of sexual intercourse among African American and White adolescents in two cities in the Southeastern United States. The focus of the present study is on the development and implementation of the campaigns, including (a) rationale and theoretical underpinnings; (b) collection, screening, and assessment of existing public service announcements; (c) development of new public service announcements; (d) study design and campaign airing plan; and (e) message exposure achieved in the campaigns. Health communication campaigns hold much promise in reaching at-risk adolescent populations with targeted, timely, and relevant risk-reduction messages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public sex has been the focus of a number of academic texts in recent years, but while some comment more generally on how the media have presented specific forms of public sexual activity, it remains unclear how the media have constructed these undertakings. The phenomenon consists of a number of subcultures aimed at providing sexual enjoyment in public settings in different ways. There has been evidence that those engaging in public sex undertake significant risk that, while motivating for those taking part, can lead to a number of tragic consequences. Some of these consequences include physical attacks by members of the public as well as susceptibility to robbery and even abduction. This article will explore one of the possible reasons behind an unfavourable view of public sex in the public conscience- the mass media, and in particular, newspapers in the United Kingdom. The way in which the media have constructed various forms of public sex will be explored, as well as the information provided in reports, and in particular, the detailing of locations of Public Sex Environments (PSEs). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research suggests sexual content is prevalent in mass media messages and this content can have an effect on viewers' attitudes about sex. The researchers used a survey to examine these relationships in young students at a large southeastern university within the theoretical framework of cultivation. The survey targeted first-semester college freshmen to obtain the best measure of attitudes before they were influenced by college life. The study did not find significant correlations between television viewing and students' sexual attitudes and behaviors, but it did find several correlations between viewing specific genres of television programming and students' sexual attitudes and behaviors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study examines the usefulness of interpersonal sources, professional sources and the mass media in providing information on sexuality, as it is perceived in the eyes of Israeli adolescents from three ethnic groups: Jews, Moslem-Arabs and Christian-Arabs. Peers, television, internet and newspapers and magazines are perceived as the most useful sources, but—regardless of ethnicity—all of the sources are perceived as moderately useful at best. Compared to Jews, Arabs perceive nearly all of the sources as more useful, but there are no major differences between Moslems and Christians. In comparison with males, females perceive their parents as more useful and the electronic media as less useful, but there are no signs of a consistent gender-ethnicity interaction. A comparison of this study's results with the findings of American research indicates that the ranking of sources according to their usefulness differs across cultures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Youth in Australia are routinely exposed to sexually explicit images. Among 16- and 17-year-olds, three-quarters of boys and one-tenth of girls have ever watched an X-rated movie. Three-quarters of 16- and 17-year-olds have been exposed accidentally to pornographic websites, while 38 percent of boys and 2 percent of girls have deliberately accessed them. Internet pornography is a particularly pervasive source of minors' exposure to pornography, both accidental and deliberate. Two features of children's exposure to pornography mirror those among adults. First, males are more likely to seek out, and are more frequent consumers of, both X-rated movies and pornographic websites. Second, Internet users of any age find it difficult to avoid unwanted encounters with sexually explicit materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexually explicit information can be encountered through the Internet by both active exploration and passive means (e.g., junk mail, email and pop-ups). The present study examined unsolicited exposure to sexually explicit material through email, junk mail and pop-ups by assessing potential variables that might impact on positive attitudes towards such sexually explicit materials and the likelihood to search for them online. The findings support previously reported gender differences in attitudes and behaviour in relation to sexually explicit materials. Overall, males felt more positive toward online sexual content and were more likely to explore unsolicited emails and pop-ups than were females. Computer use for a variety of purposes (e.g., downloading files, communication, and entertainment) predicted positive attitudes towards unsolicited sexual pop-ups and junk mail messages while sheer number of hours spent on the computer predicted searching behaviour for sexual information. Domain-specific curiosity (i.e., curiosity toward online sexual material) positively predicted both positive attitudes and searching behaviours. Implications from this exploratory study are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies of mass media show that sexual content has increased during the past three decades and is now commonplace. Research studies have examined the sexual content of many media, but not talk radio. A subcategory of talk radio, called "shock jock" radio, has been repeatedly accused of being indecent and sexually explicit. This study fills in this gap in the literature by presenting a short history and an exploratory content analysis of shock jock radio. The content analysis compares the sexual discussions of two radio talk shows: Infinity's Howard Stern Show and Clear Channel's Bob & Tom Show. doi:10.1300/ J057v13n01_06 [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this introductory article, Reichert argues that greater research attention should be paid to the area of strategic-or direct-effects of sexual information in the media. He begins by describing the nature of sexual information and the response it evokes in viewers. More important, Reichert outlines several ways that media organizations and advertisers use sex to promote their content and branded goods with the ultimate goal of enhancing revenue. Last, the author describes how the articles in this contributed volume advance the study of sex and promotion into new and important contexts (e.g., television news, sports coverage, magazine covers, shockjock programming). doi:10.1300/J057v13n01_02 [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Most work on adolescents' contact with sexuality in mainstream media has been framed in terms of media effects upon the sexual self-concepts, attitudes, and behaviors of youth, even when such causality cannot be inferred. Rarely examined are the sexual characteristics of adolescents that may predict contact with sexual media. Using Steele's (1999) Media Practice Model as a foundation, we reported on these associations for 2,184 Dutch adolescents. This study emphasized sex differences in the characteristics that predict such contact and the role of youths' critical evaluations of information about sex in the media. Correlation and regression analyses revealed several sex differences in the characteristics related to sexual media contact, with individual characteristics accounting for more variance infernales and critical evaluations accounting for more variance in males. This study underscores the need for more comprehensive, longitudinal studies of adolescents ' media consumption and its connections to sexual development in youth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A media-use questionnaire was completed by 3,261 7th and 8th graders and a subsample of 1,074 respondents was interviewed about their sexual attitudes and behaviors. Based on results from the media survey, respondents' top television shows, movies, music, Internet sites, and newspapers were content analyzed for portrayals or references to pubertal development, romantic relationships, body exposure or nudity, sexual innuendo, touching and kissing, and sexual intercourse. Overall, 11% of the media used by respondents contained sexual content. A measure called the Sexual Media Diet (SMD) was developed to assess each individual's exposure to sexual content in the media, based on the combination of media consumption and content. The SMD measure showed a statistically significant association with adolescents' sexual activity and future intentions to be sexually active, with measures of movie and music exposure showing the strongest associations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Media representations of young people are an important part of society's ongoing discussion with itself about ‘the state of its youth’. This article sets out to explore how the Irish media address the issue of young people and sexuality. Adopting a broadly social constructionist perspective, it presents qualitative case studies of the verbal and visual content of selected feature items hi the press and concludes that, at least where sexuality is at issue, young people are envisaged and presented as ‘Other’, as something puzzling arid mysterious. The tabloid and broadsheet press employ similar sets of rhetorical devices to construct this representation and to ‘make a spectacle’ of the young, often with marked gender differences. There is a consistent ‘metaphor of discovery’: the ‘lifting of a lid’ on what young people are ‘getting up to’, unknown to their parents. There is a pervasive sense of alarm, dismay, of loss and even (ambivalently) of betrayal. It is suggested that in consistently treating young people as ‘Other’, as predominantly different and difficult, these media representations may themselves be helping to construct and sustain the ‘problem’ of intergenerational relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Willingness to ban various forms of sexual violent and sexually violent media was assessed through a random digit dialing survey of adults in Seminole County, FL. Of 1,291 eligible adults contacted, 304 (23.5%) completed the interview. Substantial majorities (71-77%) supported censoring sexually violent media about half (47-54%) supported censoring nonsexual violent media, and about one third supported censoring nonviolent sexually explicit movies (32%) and videotapes (28%). Principle components analysis of these items revealed two clear factors; support for banning sexual media and support for banning violent and sexually violent media. Sexual conservatism, sex role stereotyping, authoritarianism, age, gender, concern about pornography's effects, and support for a local anti-pornography for censoring violent media. Regression analysis showed that support for banning sexual media and concern about pornography's effects both contributed to the prediction of support for anti-pornography campaigns. Contrary to expectations, those low in sex role stereotyping showed low levels of support for censoring sexual media and low levels of concern about pornography's effects, relative both to fundamentalists and other respondents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an updated longitudinal content analysis of sex references in mass circulation magazines. In 1973, the author reported on an analysis of sex references in mass circulation magazines comparing 1950, 1960, and 1970. the authors found that the number of sex references increased each decade for each magazine examined and that the overall percentage of liberal references had increased from 1950 to 1970. Here the authors examine sex references in mass circulation magazines in 1980 and compare these findings to the earlier analysis. The most publicized and perhaps the most voluminous analysis of U.S. sexual attitudes as reflected in the mass media was conducted by A. Ellis in 1950 and again in 1960 Ellis concluded that the mass media not only contained both references to sex in 1960 than in 1950 but also were more endorsing and accepting (reflecting what Ellis calls the liberal attitude) of almost all forms of sexual practices. A number of problems with Ellis' study and his conclusions have been pointed out.

The article compares the sexual permissiveness of sex-integrated dormitory living with sex-segregated dormitory living. The widespread attention given to sex, sexual attitudes, and sexual behavior by the social sciences, arts, humanities, and the mass media verifies the universality and centrality of sex in the lives of people as individuals and as members of viable, ongoing societies. The notion that all societies have developed intricate, although not identical, mechanisms for controlling sexual conduct is additional support of the major importance of sexual interaction in all societies. Further support for the importance of sex stems from knowledge through the social sciences and the humanities that sex is interrelated in many aspects with all the other major institutions, especially the family. Moreover, sexual attitudes and behavior have an influence on the person's self-concept and role performance in both primary and secondary interpersonal relationships. Of particular interest to the sociologist is the examination of various social environments as they influence the formulation of sexual attitudes and behavior. The present study focuses on one area of American sexual attitudes, that of premarital sex. A major concern here is the effect of sex-integrated living on premarital sexual attitudes.

This article comments on the book "The Social Organization of Sexuality," by Edward Laumann, John Gagnon, Robert Michael and Stuart Michaels, which deals with sexual practices in the U.S. The book's goal is to challenge common presumptions about sexuality as the province of individually oriented biology and psychology and to show its association with other socially constructed behaviors. An objection debated in and outside sociology is honesty. It is implied that the study of sexuality gives special pause and clause for subjecting all social phenomena to a sort of Kantian critique of sociological theory in conjunction with the method. Inquiry needs to be made just as systematically into what type of questions might or might not be well approached through rationally biased means. The authors believed that the media is responsible for the promulgation of earlier misconceptions about the sexual character of people in the U.S. This re-interpretation suggests that abstract images of sexuality may be inseparable from desires experienced throughout everyday life. Continuing where the authors left off requires commitment to the freeing and diversifying of sexual and social life and sociological imagination.

This study investigates the mass media's coverage of sexual topics during the years 1950, 1960, and 1970. An examination is made of the quantity of references to sex, the percentage of liberal references, and the coverage of specific sexual activities. It is ascertained that specific references to extra- marital sex and noncoital sex decreased from 1950 to 1970. References both to sex relations leading to pregnancy and to sexual deviance have doubled in the number and percentage of total sexual references in this same period. The possible effects of the activities of special interest groups in altering the mass media's coverage of sexual activities is also taken into consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article describes an activity aimed at exploring issues related to gender and communication in the realm of popular media. Popular media has a significant relationship with an individual's perception of gender and identity. Themes that are present in the media and help form that perception include the underrepresentation of women and minorities, stereotypical portrayals of women and men, and stereotypical images of relationships between men and women.

This article introduces this double-issue of "Sexualities." As theorists of sexuality have long argued, sexuality never exists on its own -- it is always embedded in systems of signifiers and meaning that well exceed simple biological "facts" and which render it profoundly ambiguous and ritualistic. People increasingly have come to live their sexualities through, and with the aid of, television, press, film, and most recently, cyberspace. This double-issue is concerned especially with looking at ways in which sexualities have become represented through some media forms -- most notably books, films, video, mass-produced calendars, television and theatrical performances. It is a growing concern amongst scholars of sexualities to 'read' the ways in which the sexual is encoded in our daily lives.

This article focuses on role of mass media in sex education. Young people in the United States today spend 6-7 hours each day, on average, with some form of media. A majority has a television in their bedroom; all have access to music and movies. Computer and Internet use is diffusing rapidly. By 2010, it is expected that most homes with children in the United States will have access to the Internet. Adolescents rank the media with parents and peers as important sources of sexual information. This may be because the media are better at depicting the passion and positive possibilities of sex than its problems and consequences. Despite increasing public concern about the potential health risks of early, unprotected sexual activity, only about one in 11 of the programs on television that include sexual content mention possible risks or responsibility. The clash between the media's depiction of sexual relations and the real-life experiences of youth contributes to their difficulties in making healthy sexual decisions. In short, the media are important sex educators today and will continue to be in the future. Therefore, efforts both to encourage the media to present a healthier view of sexuality and to create, promote and make accessible healthier sources of sexual information should continue.