A content analysis of sexual themes in Playboy cartoons

Critics of pornography have argued that the way men and women are portrayed in these media create images that can result in harmful gender socialization. The cartoons from all 1985 issues of Playboy were coded for the presence or absence of four themes that have been identified by these critics. It was found that, when these themes appeared, women were more often the victim of sexual coercion, were more often depicted as sexually naive and childlike, and were more often shown with a more attractive body than were the men in the cartoons.The authors wish to thank Mike Chambers, Bruce Healy, Cathy Thompson and Micheala Wilczynski for their help with the project.