Adolescents’ Exposure to a Sexualized Media Environment and Their Notions of Women as Sex Objects

Jochen Peter Patti M. Valkenburg 0 ) The Amsterdam School of Communications Research, University of Amsterdam , Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam, The Netherlands This study was designed to investigate whether adolescents' exposure to a sexualized media environment is associated with stronger beliefs that women are sex objects. More specifically, we studied whether the association between notions of women as sex objects and exposure to sexual content of varied explicitness (i.e., sexually nonexplicit, semi-explicit, or explicit) and in different formats (i.e., visual and audio-visual) can be better described as cumulative or as hierarchical. Further, we investigated whether this association was contingent on gender. Based on data from an on-line survey of 745 Dutch adolescents aged 13 to 18, we found that the relationship between exposure to a sexualized media environment and notions of women as sex objects followed a hierarchical pattern: Starting with adolescents' exposure to sexually semiexplicit content, the statistical significance of the relationship with notions of women as sex objects moved from semi-explicit to explicit sexual content and from visual to audio-visual formats. Exposure to sexually explicit material in on-line movies was the only exposure measure significantly related to beliefs that women are sex objects in the final regression model, in which exposure to other forms of sexual content was controlled. The relationship between exposure to a sexualized media environment and notions of women as sex objects did not differ for girls and boys. - In the past three decades, evidence has accumulated that adolescents exposure to sexual media content is related to a variety of gender stereotypes and sexual beliefs (for reviews, see Escobar-Chaves et al., 2005; Ward, 2003). Earlier researchers typically studied sexual content in a single genre (e.g., soap operas, comedies, dramas, or music videos) or a single medium (e.g., television or magazines; for reviews, see Escobar-Chaves et al., 2005; Ward, 2003). To capture adolescents media experience more adequately, researchers have recently included multiple genres (Aubrey, Harrison, Kramer, & Yellin, 2003; Ward, 2002; Ward & Friedman, 2006) and multiple media (e.g., Brown et al., 2006; LEngle, Brown, & Kenneavy, 2006; Pardun, LEngle, & Brown, 2005). Despite this fruitful development in the field, two gaps in the existing research are striking. First, researchers have hardly focused on adolescents exposure to sexually explicit material on the internet as an additional correlate of adolescents sexual beliefs. On the internet, explicit depictions of different sexual activities (e.g., oral, vaginal, and anal sex) and sexual preferences (e.g., sado-masochistic sex, fetishes) are not only easily accessible to adolescents (Cooper, 1998), they also use it (Lo & Wei, 2005; Peter & Valkenburg, 2006). Second, it is still an open question whether and to what extent adolescents notions of women as sex objects are dependent on the sexual explicitness and the visual or audio-visual format of the content. Little is known about whether adolescents consumption of, for example, sexually explicit content is more strongly associated with their sexual beliefs than is their exposure to sexually non-explicit content. Similarly, we do not know whether a potential association between sexual content and sexual beliefs differs between visual formats (e.g., pictures in magazines or on the internet) and audio-visual formats (e.g., movies on television or on the internet). As a consequence of these two gaps, Brown et al. (2006) have suggested that [a]dditional research on the effects of the media on adolescent sexuality should include exposure to Internet pornography (p. 1026). Brown et al. have also requested that [s]ubsequent analyses should look more closely to determine the relative influence of each of the component media [of the sexual media diet measure] on adolescents sexual behavior (p. 1026). In this study, we tried to address these two requests. Based on the sexual media diet measure by Brown et al. and ideas by other researchers (Brown, 2000; Brown et al., 2006; Greenfield, 2004; LEngle et al., 2006; Pardun et al., 2005; Strasburger & Donnerstein, 1999), we propose the concept of a sexualized media environment to extend this line of research. In response to Brown et al.s (2006) requests, we investigated whether adolescents exposure to sexually explicit material, particularly on the internet, is linked with their sexual beliefs in addition to their exposure to sexual content of varied sexual explicitness in other media. Further, we studied how exposure to sexual content is associated with sexual beliefs depending on the sexual explicitness of the content, the visual and audio-visual format of the material, and adolescents gender. The present study focused on adolescents beliefs that women are sex objects as a sexual belief that is potentially related to exposure to sexual content in the media. The sexual objectification of women is both a theoretically and a socially relevant construct: It further develops the notion of the body as a social construction and points to a central form of gender discrimination (Fredrickson & Roberts, 1997). Further, recent research has established a link between exposure to media coverage that sexually objectifies women and adolescents beliefs that women are sex objects (Ward, 2002; Ward & Friedman, 2006). Pursuit of this line of research in the aforementioned direction may help us to understand the relation between exposure to sexual media content and tendencies toward gender discrimination. Sexualized Media Environment There is growing consensus that adolescents live in a media-saturated world (Qrius, 2005; Roberts, Foehr, & Rideout, 2005) and are likely to be exposed to sexual content across various media (Kunkel, Eyal, Finnerty, Biely, & Donnerstein, 2005; Pardun et al., 2005). As a result, researchers have turned away from measuring adolescents exposure to only a single medium. This development is best embodied by Brown et al.s sexual media diet measure, which links adolescents exposure to various media with the sexual content found in these media (Brown et al., 2006; LEngle et al., 2006; Pardun et al., 2005). In an initial attempt to extend this measure into the direction of ecological models of adolescent sexuality, which view adolescents attitudes and behavior as a result of their interactions with their environment (Lerner & Castellino, 2002), we put forward the concept of adolescents sexualized media environment. The concept of a sexualized media environment is based on three assumptions. First, there is an unprecedented amount of sexual content in the media. Second, this sexual content is pervasive and not limited to a single medium. Third, the various media offer easy access to increasingly explicit sexual content. This applies particularly to the internet. Regarding t (...truncated)