Love is all you need: A content analysis of romantic scenes in Chinese entertainment television

Abstract

A large sample of entertainment television programs that were aired on 28 channels in China in 2004 was analyzed for romantic and sexual content. Romantic scenes, typically portraying men and women already in committed relationships, appeared in 80% of the 196 programs analyzed. The analysis suggested that, according to Chinese television in the early part of the twenty-first century, emotional love was more important than physical sexual interaction in romantic relationships. More than half of the 1112 romantic scenes analyzed depicted love between the partners without any discussion or display of physical sexual behavior. Only 8% of scenes included discussion or depiction of sexual behavior (e.g., touching, kissing, and intercourse) without some sense that the partners were in a loving, committed relationship. Sexual intercourse was implied or depicted in fewer than 2% of the romantic scenes. Findings are discussed in light of the Chinese government's periodic regulation of sexually suggestive media content and attempts to filter Internet content. The extent to which such content may affect young viewers' perceptions of romantic relationships and sexual behavior is also discussed.

Keywords:

• content analysis
• China
• television
• romantic and sexual behavior

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Center for AIDS Research (CFAR), an NIH-funded program (P30 AI50410); and NIH grant (R24 HD056670), “Partnership for Social Science Research on HIV/AIDS in China” (Gail Henderson, PI).

Notes

¹The China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS), an ongoing international collaborative project between the Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the National Institute of Nutrition and Food Safety at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention was designed to examine the effects of the health, nutrition, and family planning policies and programs implemented by national and local governments and to see how the social and economic transformation of Chinese society is affecting the health and nutritional status of its population. The CHNS surveys were conducted in 1989, 1991, 1993, 1997, 2000, 2004, 2006, and 2009.