Gen Z Rejects Hollywood Sex Scenes — Here’s What They Really Want

Published: October 28, 2024

Gen Z Rejects Hollywood Sex Scenes — Here’s What They Really Want

By Movieguide® Contributor

Hollywood keeps pumping out explicit movies and shows, but Gen Z demands less sex onscreen.

A new study conducted by the University of California, Los Angeles’ Center for Scholars & Storytellers surveyed around 1,500 people, aged 10 to 24, and found that, overwhelmingly, young people don’t want to see sex in movies and TV shows.

“63.5% of adolescents said they preferred that big and small screen stories focus on friendships, while 62.4% said sexual content isn’t needed as a plot device,” Variety reported. “Those are big jumps from the previous year when 51.5% of those surveyed said they wanted more content about people in platonic relationships, and 47.5% said that they didn’t seek out shows or movies where sex was a major plot point.”

The outlet noted that respondents aged 10-13 were not asked about their feelings on sexually explicit content.

“Our findings really seemed to solidify a trend we found emerging in our data last year: that young people are tired of seeing the same dated and unrelatable romantic tropes on screen,” said Alisha J. Hines, the director of research at the center, per Deadline. “Teens and young adults want to see stories that more authentically reflect a full spectrum of nuanced relationships.”

So, what do Gen Zers want to see onscreen?

The A.V. Club reported that young people “prefer fantasy stories (36.2 percent) to stuff about rich and famous people (7.2 percent), or personal issues (24.2 percent), actually still like going to the movies, and prefer ‘Hopeful, uplifting content with people ‘beating the odds.’”

This isn’t the first study of its kind; a study from Talker Research uncovered similar findings.

READ MORE: Gen Z TURNS OFF SEX SCENES — THEY WANT THIS INSTEAD

UCLA’s study confirms what Movieguide® has been saying all along: audiences want moral, family-friendly content — and the box office results prove it.

Movieguide®’s 2024 report to the entertainment industry found that “the Top 25 domestic earners [at the box office] with a strong or very strong Christian or redemptive worldview averaged $244.95 million when combined.”