Understanding the role of entertainment media in the sexual socialization of youth.

How might media exposure affect sexual attitudes and behavior? Theoretical mechanisms

In understanding the media’s role as an agent of sexual socialization, it is important to address the issue of mechanism. More specifically, how might media content get into the minds of viewers, shaping their sexual attitudes, assumptions, and behaviors? Whereas initial speculations may have taken the "magic bullet" approach, in which it was assumed that content is absorbed unchallenged by passive viewers, current theorizing acknowledges the general complexity of the dynamics involved. Viewers, even the youngest of children, are not mindless drones, soaking up and imitating all media images. Indeed, many viewers are exposed to the same sexual content, but their subsequent beliefs and behaviors are not equivalent. In many current approaches, viewers are believed to construct meaning from the content presented based on their existing worldviews, schemas, and personal experiences—a notion that focuses on selective effects based on individual differences. Consequently, any given content must be integrated with viewers’ existing perspectives and with input from other sources (e.g., peers, family), and is likely to mean different things to different people. It is also now assumed that connections between media exposure and viewers’ social attitudes are bi-directional. While media content may influence viewers, it is the viewers who actively select and are drawn to specific content.

Because no causal model specifically addresses the media’s role as a sexual socializer, research in this area has been either atheoretical, or has drawn support from one of three general theoretical models. For survey research examining the media’s influence on viewers’ sexual attitudes and assumptions, cultivation theory has been the dominant model referenced. This theory proposes that television’s consistent yet restricted images and portrayals construct a specific portrait of reality, and as viewers watch more and more television, they gradually come to cultivate or adopt beliefs about the world that coincide with this portrait. Under these claims, this perspective focuses on people’s regular exposure levels and on the differing perceptions of "heavy" versus "light" viewers. If content analyses indicate that sex on TV is glamorous, prevalent, recreational, and relatively risk free, the cultivation model predicts that frequent viewers will be more inclined than sporadic viewers to endorse and accept this perspective about sexuality. Additional work by Shrum and colleagues examining the specific psychological processes driving cultivation effects point to the role of construct accessibility, arguing that specific associations and assumptions are more accessible in memory for heavy viewers compared to lighter viewers. Although cultivation theory has been heavily criticized for its assumption of uniform media content and its minimal attention to viewer choices and interpretations, it remains one of the most widely used models in this area.

A second theoretical perspective commonly used is Bandura’s cognitive social learning theory, which examines the influence of observational learning on the adoption of specific behaviors. Here, the general notion is that through the observation of media models, viewers come to learn which behaviors are "appropriate" and "inappropriate"—that is, which will later be rewarded or punished. These behaviors are not necessarily imitated immediately, but instead the knowledge is stored as behavioral scripts to be retrieved and applied when individual circumstances elicit it. The theory has been expanded from its original form to acknowledge both the role of cognitive processes and the interactive influences of environmental forces. Currently several factors are believed to determine who and what are modeled. More specifically, observers are believed to be more likely to learn and model the behavior of models who are perceived as attractive, powerful, and similar, and whose behaviors are rewarded or not punished, salient, simple, possess functional value, and are possible. This theory would predict that observing attractive TV characters enjoying sexual intercourse with few negative consequences will lead teens to perceive this behavior as appropriate and to store this information for later use.

A third theoretical perspective supporting research in this area is priming theory, which draws from several cognitive theories focusing on schema activation and accessibility. This perspective is typically used for examining short-term effects of media stimuli presented in experimental settings. According to this perspective, the presentation and processing of a stimulus with a particular meaning "primes" or activates semantically related concepts and calls them to mind. Such priming makes this schema-related information temporarily highly accessible, increasing the likelihood that subsequently encountered persons, stimuli, or events will be appraised in the context of the primed and accessible schema. Hence, conceptually related material viewed or experienced after the exposure will seem more acceptable or appropriate. This process may also lead to longer-term effects via chronic accessibility. Here, the notion is that frequently activated schemas become readily accessible, and are therefore likely to influence judgments regardless of priming manipulations or situational influences. Thus, if sexual stereotypes are frequently encountered, related schemas are frequently activated; with each activation, those particular schemas or ways of viewing the world grow stronger and more valid.

In addition to these specific causal models, others have attempted to outline the larger configuration of components that comprise media influence. One recent example is the Media Practice Model asserts that media practice can only be understood in context. According to this model, adolescents’ selections, interpretations, and uses of the media are heavily influenced by basic sociocultural factors such as gender and race, by adolescents’ developing identities, and by a multitude of conditions in their lives, labeled "lived experience," which encompass neighborhood influences, family life, friendships and peer culture experiences, and religious backgrounds and beliefs. The notion is that adolescents carry their particular life histories with them, and that their perceptions of media content are filtered through these experiences. This model also highlights the ongoing reciprocal nature of media uses and effects, assuming that these processes interact with each other and with the viewers’ current and emerging sense of self or identity. Although this model does not make predictions about effects, it provides a useful framework of how to study connections between sexuality and media use.

Finally, it is frequently noted that numerous factors mediate and moderate these processes, determining under what conditions media effects will and will not occur. These factors include both characteristics of the media content, such as the genre, complexity of the messages, and attractiveness of the protagonists, as well as several features of the viewer, such as age, sex, cognitive capacities, and perceived realism. Paramount among these factors is age or developmental level, which exerts influence both directly and indirectly. For example, developmental level directly affects viewers’ ability to process, understand, and evaluate sexual content, which is often quite adult in nature. In one study, younger adolescents (12-year-olds) had more difficulty correctly understanding televised sexual innuendoes than did their older peers (14- and 16-year-olds). Developmental level also affects viewers’ perceptions of and reactions to sexual content. For example, interviews with adolescent girls about their media use revealed striking differences in how sexual content was perceived depending on the girls’ level of physical, personal, and sexual development. Many of the preadolescent girls (e.g., those not yet menstruating) were disinterested and disgusted by sexual content, while many of the older girls were intrigued and solicitous. Using retrospective data from 214 college students, found strong age of exposure differences in the emotional and physical impact of students’ early encounters with sexual media. For example, experiences with sexual media recalled from childhood (ages 5–12) elicited more embarrassment, guilt, confusion, and sexual learning than did experiences recalled from adolescence. In considering the research questions and relations under study, it becomes apparent that the dynamics of how media use affects sexual socialization are neither simple nor direct, but instead are likely to be age dependent, and to involve multiple constructs, mechanisms, and contributing variables.