Turns out that the oft-made claim that advertisers use sex and provocatively-dressed models to sell products has no basis, Ynet has discovered.
According to a new study released by Amir Hetzroni the Jezreel Valley College, just four percent of television commercials show sexual behavior. And even when they do, says the study, the sex is limited to moderate and normative behavior such as kissing or hugging.
The study is based on the objective analysis of approximately 3,500 ads that appeared on TV channels two and 10 between 1999 and 2005. The study found that just 0.3 percent showed actual sexual intercourse, and 0.2 percent gave some expression to homosexual behavior.
Divergent sexual behavior was not shown at all, and 2.5 percent of all ads featured a kiss.
The study found no instances of non-normative sexual behavior such as rape, sexual violence, prostitution, promiscuity or group sex.
Almost no nudity
With regard to nudity, television ads are particularly unexciting: Just three percent of ads show any female nudity at all, and five percent show some degree of male nudity. In the vast majority of cases, large swaths of the upper body were shown, and almost always blurred. Full nudity was shown in 0.2 percent of all ads.
According to Hezroni, TV viewers must watch approximately 500 ads to get to see an openly sexual act or full nudity. Even talk about sex is nadir: Just one-in-200 ads feature talk about sex, a statistic that remained static throughout the years of the study.
According to Hetzroni, there are several explanations for the lack of sex in advertising: censorship by Channel Two, advertiser's fear that concentrating on sex will take viewer's attention away from their product. In addition, they are afraid of arousing viewer's ire or bringing about a boycott by conservative viewers of their products.
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