Is Sexual Consent Sexy? Investigating the Effects of a Televised Depiction of Verbal Sexual Consent on College Students’ Sexual Consent Attitudes and Behavioral Intentions

Jennifer Stevens Aubrey, Larissa Terán, Leah Dajches, Heather Gahler, Kun Yan

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

3 Scopus citations

Abstract

Although depictions of sexual consent are rare in the media, such portrayals have the potential to instruct young people on the procedural details of sexual consent. Taking an entertainment-education (E-E) perspective, we examined the effects of a televised depiction of sexual consent that contained verbal sexual consent, versus a televised depiction that only included nonverbal sexual consent, versus a no-exposure control group to test for changes in college students’ attitudes and behavioral intentions toward sexual consent. In the pretest-posttest experimental design, those who were assigned to the nonverbal video condition reported less favorable attitudes about sexual consent between pretest and posttest. Additionally, interpersonal liking was an important facilitator of the E-E impact of the verbal sexual consent condition; the more the participants liked the characters in the verbal condition, the more positively about sexual consent they felt and the more likely they were to plan to engage in sexual consent. Narrative engagement did not mediate the effects of experimental condition on sexual consent attitudes and behavioral intentions. The implications for E-E are discussed.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)2527-2536
Number of pages10
JournalHealth Communication
Volume38
Issue number12
DOIs
StatePublished - 2023

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Health(social science)
  • Communication

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