Chapter 4 Sexual Content in Soap Operas - Leicester Research ...

Sex and Sexuality: A Content Analysis of Soap Operas
in just over 15% of all codable 483 sexual portrayals. Once again, such references
were most prevalent in Hollyoaks in the City and Emmerdale, which dedicated
separate storylines to sexual confusion, homosexual relationships, and
discrimination against and bullying of gay characters. However, Coronation Street
and Hollyoaks also included references to homosexuality, despite the fact that they
did not include storylines tackling homosexuality and homosexual relationships.
Evidence also suggested that non-heterosexual portrayals were more likely to
revolve around discussion or narratives of homosexual and bisexual themes and
relationships (39% of all non-heterosexual cases) than visual depictions of such
behaviours (61%), thus reflecting the overall pattern of sexual portrayals in the
genre. However, two of the interesting findings to emerge were (a) the virtual
absence of portrayals of either homosexual or bisexual behaviours in the mainstream
soap operas (Emmerdale and Hollyoaks), which can be attributed to the wider
public‘s sensitivity towards, and acceptability of homosexuality and bisexuality, and
(b) their prevalence (21 out of all 22 portrayals of behaviours) in the late night spin-
off, Hollyoaks in the City.
Previous studies (Hobson, 2003; Millwood-Hargrave, 1992 and 1999) indicated
clearly that television audiences, especially middle-aged viewers and those 55-years
old and over, despite changes of attitudes and perceptions over time, still felt that the
portrayal of homosexual or bisexual behaviours across prime-time televisions
programmes was still unacceptable; and that soap opera viewers, while accepting
soap operas‘ homosexual and heterosexual storylines (narratives), tended to react
quite strongly to soap operas‘ visual depictions of homosexual behaviours. With the
public‘s sensitivity towards certain types of homosexual portrayal, daytime and
prime-time soap operas find themselves confined to portraying non-heterosexual
topics through narratives rather than visual depictions.
As for the themes of sexual behaviours in general and that of sexual intercourse
in particular, the findings showed that the majority (90%) of sexual behaviours
across all soap operas occurred within familiar generic and common relationship
contexts or themes such as established or non-established relationships and extra-
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