Sexual content in the media has been an enormous issue in the United States for many decades. Researchers are constantly finding new information about the effects sexual media have on children’s attitudes and behaviors. Rebecca L. Collins et al., researchers from the University of California in Santa Barbara, California, reason that there is valid, credible research to believe television is the principle contributor of teenagers’ dangerous attitudes about sex. Feelings and thoughts about sex are formed by society and customs, and television is a huge element in the lives of children since they watch nearly three hours every day (280). Truly, children learn about sex from schools, peers, and parents, but the media play a bigger role on how teenagers develop positions about sex.
The television industry has seen some of the most criticism for sexual content. This issue has found its way up to the U.S. Supreme Court with the Pacifica Case by trying to keep sexual content off the air when children are most likely to be watching. Although sexual television can be argued to be beneficial to adolescents’ growth, I believe exposure to sexual content on television negatively impacts adolescents’ sexual attitudes and behaviors because adolescents develop their identities through imitation, positive sexual behavior is portrayed and is a repeated theme in television, and television is the main information center for children on how they should act in society.
The television industry considerably started to take off in the 1950s and has not looked back since. Indeed, it is a growing medium, and more important, television is a cultural unifier. It is an educator to all age groups, ethnic backgrounds, genders, and to every person all around the world. Increasingly, it has become the top advertising medium in the United States spending nearly $66 billion every year. Television is a window to the outside world, especially for young children and adolescents because they are still creating their identities, still establishing their beliefs and attitudes, and still developing their bodies. In fact, Amy Bleakley et al., from the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, confirm that adolescents and children in the United States interact with different media like television, radio, and print for approximately six to seven hours daily (443). This fact shows why media industries, especially the television industry, are so important to the United States. Additionally, Liliana Escobar-Chaves et al., researchers from the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston, Texas, point out that television is an omnipresent medium and nearly every American home contains one television or more (309). Television industry receives praises for its positive learning environment for kids, but it collects much condemnation for its negative impact on young adults with increases over the years in drug content, violence, and low culture entertainment. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, a typical American adolescent sees roughly 14,000 scenes with sexual messages in the media every year (1). Most important, television has lead researchers to believe that exposure to sexual content at a young age can potentially cause negative views toward sex in general.
Notably, many teenagers in the United States are experiencing sex for the first time at younger ages than ever before. Escobar-Chaves et al. assert that almost half of secondary school children have had sex at least once (303). Sexually transmitted diseases have seen massive increases. Escobar-Chaves et al. point out that teenagers are at most risk for sexually transmitted diseases. To emphasize this point, approximately four million adolescents get a sexual infection every year in the United States (303). The issue of sex and young people is not going to go away on its own. Researchers have done substantial amounts of work trying to figure out the cause or causes of teens’ negative attitudes and behaviors toward sexual intercourse, a fact that makes this issue noteworthy. Many researchers and scholars are just starting to figure out that the problem lies within the contents of the mass media, specifically television. Cheryl Somers and Joshua Tynan, from the Department of Education at Wayne State University in Detroit, reported in 2001 that the number of images of sex on television has augmented gradually from year to year, and more and more adolescents are participating in sexual intercourse than in years past (16). The research is crucial to understand because there seems to be a pretty high correlation between viewing sexual content and real life sexual activity. In opposition to this position and issue, correlation is not causation, a fact that makes researchers skeptical about the idea that sexual content on television influences children in a negative way.
Without question, it is not surprising that sexually transmitted diseases are common in the United States, especially among young people. Young people are learning certain attitudes and behaviors from characters on television that are most like them. Unquestionably, I fully believe there is a strong correlation between sexual content on television and the attitudes and behaviors developed by adolescents. Much of the sexual programming is only highlighting the positives of sexual behavior and not informing about the potential dangers. So, many children are being misled by thinking the make-believe television world translates nicely into the real world. However, studies show no signs of causation. Some researchers believe that the media play a limited, contributing role to children’s sexual attitudes, but media are not the sole cause. I pointed out a massive problem in the television industry. Not only on television, sex is in other mediums as well, because it is a giant success for media people, especially advertisers. Sexual messages are in radio, on billboards, in magazines, in movies, and sex can be even found subliminally. Therefore, only looking at sexual content on television covers a small part of the problem. There are many different, conflicting opinions and beliefs about sex in the media. Therefore, a consensus on what to do in the near future seems improbable. Even more important, I truly think children are of the greatest concern and interest for the United States in the future. The impact of sexual content on their innocent minds is going to affect the future of this entire country for many years to come.
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