Kids, Sex and TV: Study Is Troubling in an Unintended Way

A group of researchers at Children's Hospital in Boston took note of the television and movies that 754 children watched on two random days -- one weekday and one weekend day -- and recorded the quantity of that entertainment that, based on the show's titles, had been deemed "adult-targeted" by a group of University of Michigan grad students.

Then the researchers got back in touch with the 754 children five years later and logged what TV shows they watched on two more random days. They also asked each of them -- who by then ranged in age from 12 to 18 -- if they'd lost their virginity yet.

The percentage who said "yes" did not differ very much from the teen sex stats issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, according to study leader Hernan Delgado.

And yet, based on this information, the researchers concluded "early onset" of sexual activity among teens may relate to the amount of adult TV and movie content children were exposed to during their childhood. No word from the researchers on the possible role of, you know, parents.

They also found -- pay attention, all you young mothers -- that if children watched 2.37 hours of "adult-themed" programming over the course of two days, they were 33 percent less likely to have had sex in their teens than if they watched 3.37 hours, and 66 percent less likely to have had sex in their teens than if they watched 4.37 hours. Which would seem to suggest a diet of 2.37 hours of adult-themed programming per 48 hours is some kind of promiscuity vaccine -- a bit of the bad stuff inoculates you against the scourge.

Additionally, the study found that becoming sexually active in adolescence did not subsequently increase one's viewing of adult-targeted television and movies. So if you're thinking about getting Junior a hooker and some condoms for his birthday, not to worry -- it won't turn him into a deviant smut-TV watcher.

Delgado said researchers looked only at two days' worth of TV and movie viewing because of financial constraints. They also did not look at whether the episodes of the shows watched did in fact contain adult material. Not every episode of "Friends," for example, was about who's shagging whom -- okay, most were, but some were not.

"They didn't watch the shows, they just looked at the titles," Delgado said of how the adult-content tag was put on programs by those grad students.

"At least two people on their own assessed whether or not the show is intended for adults," Delgado explained. He declined to name the shows watched by the children in the study. But as a for instance, he said, "Friends" is a show targeting adults, while "Sesame Street" targets kids. As for "Saved by the Bell," he noted, some might say it was for adults and some might argue it is for the general public. But in general, most prime-time broadcast TV would fall under the adult-targeted description, he said.

Because this study contained both the words "television" and "sex," it got a lot of pickup among The Reporters Who Cover Television. In the comments section at the bottom of one online news story about the study, some wise person who goes by the name Matt noted that, despite his watching of countless hours of television, presumably some adult-targeted, as a tot, he did not lose his virginity until nearly age 21 because "you still gotta know how to properly talk to members of the opposite sex and not appear weird and inappropriate or unappealing -- stuff that TV definitely does not teach you."

We rest our case.