SEXUALLY EXPLICIT CONTENT AND POPULAR CULTURE 1
SEXUALLY EXPLICIT CONTENT AND POPULAR CULTURE: A SURVEY OF RESEARCH
AND AN APPLICATION TO THE EARLY ADOPTER AUDIENCE
The debate over the influence and impact of sexually explicit material misses a key segment
of the audience for such content – early adopters. While marketing research shows the considerable
size of this audience, and their role in the diffusion of new media technologies, the research on the
effects of sexually explicit content has been conducted primarily on college students. Doing so
prevents an understanding of the primary consumer of sexually explicit material, why they choose it
over other content, and how such choices play out in their professional and personal lives. This
paper presents both an argument for why research into early adopters and sexually explicit material
should be conducted as well as a framework of questions for what such research should focus on in
the future. To accomplish this an overview of the available social science research on the effects of
sexually explicit material is first presented, followed by an examination of early adopters and the
characteristics that define them, concluding with a presentation of the links between the two and
suggestions for future research.