Inspite of the overwhelming heterosexuality of main-stream media representations…

Inspite of the overwhelming heterosexuality of conventional news representations, portrayals of homosexual and lesbian people on tv are becoming significantly more widespread since 1997 whenever Ellen became the initial tv program to possess a gay character that is leading. This enhance is visible when you look at the introduction of homosexual figures on numerous programs such as for example Spin City, ER, Dawson’s Creek, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, along with demonstrates concentrate on homosexual figures in leading functions such as for instance Will and Grace and it is All Relative. In addition, cable channels have actually included programs such as for example Queer as Folk, Six Feet Under, and Oz that depict homosexual figures much more plot that is complex in accordance with more explicit sexual habits.

Even though existence of lgbt figures might have increased recently on both broadcast that is commercial cable systems, it really is ambiguous exactly just just how frequently television addresses the intimate problems and issues of intimate minorities.

As noted early in the day, when homosexual and lesbian figures have actually been a part of programs, they usually have frequently been portrayed in asexual contexts. Furthermore, the majority of exactly just just what happens to be posted up to now about homosexuality and tv happens to be qualitative (including show that is single studies), centering on exactly how certain programs have actually portrayed homosexual figures. Although many content analyses have examined the total amount of sexual content shown on tv generally speaking (Cope Farrar & Kunkel, 2002; Greenberg et that is al; Kunkel et al., 1999, 2003; Kunkel, Cope Farrar, Biely, Maynard Farinola, & Donnerstein, 2001; Sapolsky & Tabarlet, 1991; Ward, 1995), none have actually reported regarding the prevalence of intimate portrayals and discuss sexual dilemmas associated with gays, lesbians, or bisexuals.

This paper targets factors evaluating nonheterosexual content that had been included as an element of two bigger content analyses examining intimate content more broadly on US tv.

Information through the 2001 2002 and 2002 2003 tv seasons are widely used to respond to questions in regards to the prevalence and regularity of intimate behavior and talk that is sexual to nonheterosexuals. Particularly, the information analyses address two research that is broad: (1) from what extent are nonheterosexual intimate themes, especially intimate behavior and speak about sex, present in television development general and exactly just what habits emerge across system genres, community types, and prime time versus nonprime time development? (2) When nonheterosexual content that is sexual take place, what exactly is its regularity and just how does it differ across genres, variety of community, and prime time versus nonprime time development?

System Examples

A 3 composite week sampling plan ended up being utilized to get two big yearly random examples of tv programs of interest that is greatest to adolescents and that were comprehensive of all sections associated with tv industry. Programs had been taped from 11 channels 6 commercial broadcast systems (ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, UPN, and WB) and 5 cable systems (BET, Cinemax, HBO, MTV, and Showtime). The Steve Harvey Show, Moesha, Fresh Prince of Bel Air, One on One); WB, which tailors its programming to white youth, with programs such as Gilmore Girls, 7th Heaven, Sabrina, and Smallville; and MTV, which shows music videos and other programs (e.g., dating reality shows) watched by many teens and young adults because the content analyses were part of a larger research project on television exposure and adolescent sexuality, several networks were included because of their appeal to young audiences including UPN, which televises a substantial number of programs with young African American characters ( e.g.

Composite week sampling designs have now been found in past content analysis studies to have representative examples of tv development (Kunkel et al., 1999, 2001, 2003; Madden & Grube, 1994; Wallack, Grube, Madden, & Breed, 1990; Wilson et al., 1997). This sampling strategy involves arbitrarily picking times of the week or certain time slots for recording over many weeks to cut back prospective bias that might be introduced if all taping had been done inside a solitary calendar week. Recording of this test happened mainly over a 7 week duration when you look at the autumn every year. Because season premiere episodes are staggered through the thirty days of September, we started taping when all nonsyndicated show were showing episodes through the season that is current. Each week, three various times of the week had been arbitrarily chosen for taping from all 11 channels, along with 7 days for the week represented 3 x within the test. The 8 hour time block for taping extended from 3:00 p.m. (from which time many youth are away from college) to 11:00 p.m. (through prime time). The process of recapturing missed episodes (like redtube those which is why the satellite sign had been lost or even the show was pre empted by sporting or other events that are special proceeded through the entire winter season.