Who wants to marry a millionaire? Reality dating television programs, attitudes toward sex, and sexual behaviors

Past research has revealed associations between television viewing and sexual attitudes and behaviors. We examined a burgeoning new television genre, reality dating programs (RDPs). Undergraduate students (ages 18–24) reported their overall television viewing, their RDP viewing, and their involvement with RDPs (watching in order to learn and watching in order to be entertained). They also completed measures of attitudes toward sex, dating, and rela-tionships, and answered questions about sexual behavior. Most participants were occasional or frequent viewers of at least one RDP. Men reported using RDPs for learning more than did women; there was no gender difference in use of RDPs for entertainment. Total amount of RDP viewing was positively correlated, for both men and women, with adversarial sexual beliefs, endorsement of a sexual double standard, and the beliefs that men are sex-driven, that appearance is important in dating, and that dating is a game. In all cases, however, these relationships were partially or totally mediated through viewer involvement. Men and women who watched RDPs tended to be less sexually experienced; there were few other correlations with sexual behaviors. KEY WORDS: reality dating television programs; viewer involvement; attitudes toward sex; sexual behaviors; entertainment and learning motives. Exploring one’s sexual identity and learning how to manage physical and emotional intimacy in relationships with others are fundamental develop-mental tasks for adolescents and young adults (Ar-nett, 2000; Collins & Sroufe, 1999). Although such exploration offers emerging adults a platform from which to form healthy intimate relationships, the de-velopment of sexual values and attitudes toward sex is subject to many social influences. Adolescents are exposed to numerous messages about sexuality, from a variety of sources. These messages impact ado-lescents ’ attitudes toward and beliefs about datin