title: Alcohol on prime-time television.
abstract: Alcohol acts and scenes from a sample of 122 hours of prime-time television programs aired in the fall of 1984 were studied. Approximately 80% of the 116 episodes studied contained one or more appearances of alcohol. The appearance of alcohol on dramatic series was especially high with 9 of 10 episodes containing some verbal or visual reference to alcohol. Alcohol was ingested on 60% of all the programs. Overall, the sample contained 10.65 drinking acts per hour. Dramas, comprising 56% of the sample hours, accounted for most alcohol behavior--11 drinking acts per hour. Put in audience terms, a regular viewer of dramas would be likely to see more than 20 drink acts per evening.
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000428:Alcohol Drinking / Q000523:psychology*; D000434:Alcoholic Beverages; D005783:Gender Identity; D006801:Humans; D012938:Social Perception; D013690:Television