In the scene the actress was conversing about who was going to lose their virginity first. The teenage actress was clearly upset, that another teen peer was going to lose her virginity before her. It was perceived as cool to have sex. The actress was upset that her not-as-popular teen peer was going to have sex before her. .
Following the clip, the focus group, commented. They felt that the message being sent was that sex is cool, that if they were not having sex, they should be embarrassed. They felt that it was humiliating that the other actresses were laughing at the teen that had not had sex. Berk speaks of the imaginary audience(page 375), that teens always see themselves as on stage. Teens are extremely self-conscious, and avoid embarrassment. Teens would go to great lengths to avoid humiliation, and this scene was clearly showing that. The actress would have rather had sex to avoid peer humiliation.
Later, the focus group discussed the scene from the sitcom targeted to 14 & 15 years olds, called "Dawson's Creek-. The scene was about two teens who were going to have sex for the first time. The teens were not nave to realize that the TV show was setting up a perfect' scenario for the first romantic experience. They noticed that the TV show did not mention STD's. Interestingly, they were not surprised. They commented, "sex sells-. The teens were perceptive enough to know that TV is a business, and business means money.
Parents want to know, are kids more likely to have sex, if they watch TV? Researchers can not answer that, exactly, but what they do say is, the more you see the same thing over and over again, the more likely you are to believe it. For instance, a teen girl may have never kissed a boy, but the message of how to do this, has been imprinted in her memory from repeatedly seeing it on TV. She can than model a kiss, and not even know where she learned it from.
In the article, "Teens first sex is at home-, USA Today (09/02), a survey showed that teens were having sex in their homes, or at their partners' home.
Oh, Gods!, by Toby Lester, discusses the profusion of new religious movements - NRMs for short. The five chapters that make up the article would be interesting to anyone who wants to learn about various religions, their histories, or those who research them. Cataloging a variety of prominent movemen...
