Media Aware, a comprehensive sex education program with a media literacy education approach, showed several significant improvements in sexual health cognitions among young adult community college students, suggesting it is 'a promising method to improve the sexual health of young adults attending community college.'
The Media Aware intervention reduced students' perceived realism of media messages about sex at posttest.
The Media Aware intervention reduced students' positive attitudes about risky sex at posttest.
The Media Aware intervention reduced descriptive normative beliefs about unprotected and risky sexual activity.
The Media Aware intervention increased self-efficacy to use dental dams among students.
Students with lower pretest self-efficacy to refuse unprotected sex showed greater intervention benefits.
Gender moderated the intervention effect on identification with media messages, with women in the intervention group reporting less identification with media messages than women in the control group.
Media Aware is a comprehensive sex education program that uses a media literacy education approach delivered to community college students aged 18-19.
This research suggests that a sex education program called Media Aware, which teaches young adults how to critically analyze sexual content in media, can meaningfully change how community college students think about sex and sexual risk. The study tested the program across 23 college campuses with over 1,100 students aged 18-19, randomly assigning them to either receive the program or wait to receive it later. Students who went through Media Aware were less likely to believe that sexual portrayals in media reflect reality, held less favorable views toward risky sexual behavior, and felt more confident in their ability to use protective measures like dental dams compared to students who had not yet received the program. The research also found that the program worked especially well for certain groups of students. Those who started out with lower confidence in protecting themselves sexually benefited the most in terms of building that confidence. Students who initially held stronger beliefs that risky sexual behavior was normal among their peers showed the greatest reductions in those beliefs after the program. Additionally, women who received the program were less likely to personally identify with sexual media messages compared to women who had not yet received it. This research suggests that incorporating media literacy — teaching people to think critically about how sex is portrayed in movies, TV, and online — into sex education programs may be a useful strategy for helping young adults make safer decisions. Community colleges, which serve a broad and diverse population of young adults, may be an important setting for delivering this type of health education.
Scull T, Dodson C, Kupersmidt J, Evans-Paulson R, Stump K, Reeder L. (2024). A Media Literacy Education Approach to Sexual Health Promotion: Immediate Effects of Media Aware on the Sexual Health Cognitions of Young Adult Community College Students.. Journal of health communication. https://doi.org/10.1080/10810730.2024.2433527