1985 Adolescents and Their Exposure to TV and Movie Sex
Investigators: Bradley S. Greenberg

The focus of the Adolescents and Their Exposure to TV and Movie Sex study was to identify and examine the characteristics of adolescents which are associated with their media experience. Four groups of predictor variables were central to the project: demographic variables, family structure variables, self and social perceptions, and mediation variables. Data for this project were collected in the spring of 1985 through questionnaires. Students were asked to complete questionnaires that contained items pertaining to (1) media use patterns, (2) family characteristics, (3) mediation practices of parents, and (4) attitudes toward dating and sex roles. Following completion of the project, the 19 most frequently watched television programs (daytime and primetime) and 16 commercial movies were content analyzed to determine the adolescents' "diet" of media sex. This study includes 376 variables for 1,462 adolescents aged 13-19.