CHICAGO — New research suggests that pregnancy rates are much higher among teens who watch a lot of TV with sexual dialogue and behavior compared with those who have tamer viewing tastes.
Sex and the City, anyone? That was one of the shows used in the research.
The new study is the first to link those viewing habits with teen pregnancy, said lead author Anita Chandra, a Rand Corp. behavioral scientist. Teens who watched the raciest shows were twice as likely to become pregnant over the next three years as those who watched few such programs.
Previous research by some of the same scientists had already found that watching lots of sex on TV can influence teens to have sex at earlier ages.
Shows that highlight only the positive aspects of sexual behavior without the risks can lead teens to have unprotected sex "before they're ready to make responsible and informed decisions," Chandra said.
The study was being released Monday in the November issue of Pediatrics. It involved 2,003 12- to 17-year-old girls and boys nationwide questioned by telephone about their TV viewing habits in 2001.
Teens were re-interviewed twice, the last time in 2004, and asked about pregnancy. Among girls, 58 became pregnant during the follow-up, and among boys, 33 said they had gotten a girl pregnant.
Participants were asked how often they watched any of more than 20 TV shows popular among teens at the time or which were found to have lots of sexual content. These included Sex and the City, That '70s Show and Friends.
Pregnancies were twice as common among those who said they watched such shows regularly, compared with teens who said they hardly ever saw them.
Chandra said TV-watching was strongly connected with teen pregnancy even when other factors were considered, including grades, family structure and parents' educational level.
But the study didn't adequately address other issues, such as self-esteem, family values and income, contends Elizabeth Schroeder, executive director of Answer, a Rutgers University-based teen sex education program.
"The media does have an impact but we don't know the full extent of it because there are so many other factors," Schroeder said.
But Bill Albert of the non-profit National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy said, "Media helps shape the social script for teenagers. Most parents know that. This is just good research to confirm that."
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