Violence and Sex in Television Programs Do Not Sell Products in Advertisements

Bushman, Brad J. 2005. "Violence and Sex in Television Programs Do Not Sell Products in Advertisements." Psychological Science (Wiley-Blackwell) 16, no. 9: 702-708.

Brad Bushman’s study compliments and reinforces the findings discovered in a previously posted article, “Does sex sell? The effect of sexual programme content on the recall of sexual and non-sexual advertisements.” As found in Parker and Furnham’s study, Bushman argues that television programs containing sex or violence hinder brand recall and reduce consumers’ interest in buying or selecting a coupon for that brand. Surprisingly, however, Bushman did not find any differences or correlations concerning gender and age.

In his experiment, Bushman recruited 336 participants, aged 18 to 54, through newspaper ads in central Iowa. Age was distributed to be representative of US adults owning a television in their household. Participants were compensated. Participants were divided into four groups, 84 in each, and asked to watch a television show containing sex, violence, both sex and violence, or one with no sex and violence. Each television program included the same twelve advertisements. Bushman measured participants’ recall of advertisements, brand recognition, buying intentions, and coupon choices.

This article has its pros and cons. The article is current, as it was published in 2005, and the study is grounded in previous theory. Bushman offers a literature review, citations for further reading, and useful background information. He discusses the practical implications of the study; however he did not mention any limitations to his experiment. I do not plan on studying types of television programs in my research project, as advertisements will be my sole independent variable, yet I still believe Bushman’s experiment data and literature review will serve as a good secondary source and will be useful when comparing consumer behavior.