SEX IN PRIME-TIME TELEVISION - 1979 VERSUS 1989

One week of primetime network television from 1989 was content analyzed with a coding scheme previously used to examine sex on television in 1979. At a time when AIDS and high rates of teenage pregnancy call for sexual responsibility, the study found that sexual behavior and language have not diminished over the 10-year period. Instances of suggestive sexual displays and noncriminal sex acts declined, while sexual touching increased. Explicit intercourse, not in evidence in 1979, was shown in 1989. Issues of safe sex, sexually transmitted disease, and contraception are rarely addressed. Sex in primetime occurs predominantly among the unmarried, and white males typically initiate sexual acts and words.