Dr Lisa Garwood-Cross - Sex Edutainment Study

Given that sex education has frequently been destabilised through moral panics and political agendas, some have taken to trying to find alternative methods of disseminating sex education such as the use of social media, including YouTube. This content utilises entertainment tropes to create engaging sex edutainment about sex, relationships and sexual health, often delivered in a shame-free way by content creators who utilise tools such as direct-to-camera address and approachable language to build rapport. This study sought to understand the possibilites and problems of YouTube sex edutainment for use with British young people aged between 13 - 24-years-old.

The three-phase study was rooted in Actor-Network Theory and traced the connections between the YouTube platform, sex edutainment influencers and young people. The methods included:

A walkthrough method reading of the YouTube platform
Analysis of 60,070 public comments on 22 influencer-created sex edutainment videos
Email interviews with three sex edutainment influencers
Online survey conducted with 85 young people aged 13 - 24-years-old.

Young people's previous experiences of sex education in both survey cohorts indicated that they the majority did not have their information needs met and this left some feeling unprepared for situations they encountered.
Surveyed young people were highly digitally active with internet, device and YouTube usage all highly common. This made YouTube a suitable and accessible platform for the majority of young people who felt YouTube and the internet were accessible, led to less embarrassment and judgement, and provided different forms of knowledge about sexual health such as the lived experience of others. Many had already used the internet to gather information about sex, relationships, and sexual health. However, very few surveyed resondees appeared to be using YouTube sex edutainment content.
Most young people surveyed would share information from relevant sex and relationships information videos with a friend if they felt it would be helpful to them, for some this involved the sharing of links, however others preferred to talk about content themselves. Respondents displayed an astute awareness of assessing content’s suitability and being considerate in how this sharing occurred before passing content or information on to their peers.
Many of the young people engaged with influencers, however there were mixed opinions on influencer trustworthiness. Young people were cautious of advertising and what it signalled about an influencer’s motives.
Young people were largely concerned about misinformation online when looking for relationships, sex, and sexual health information on both YouTube and the wider internet, and many identified the importance of trusted and reliable sources, such as the NHS.

Analysis of public responses to sex edutainment influencer content highlighted some interesting findings:

Audience responses largely indicated trust for influencers, with some viewing influencers a role model or trusted friend or sibling-like guide. The content was found to have educational potential, creating open conversation about sex and relationships amongst the community called into being by the influencers. Commenters shared personal experiences, sought advice, shared how the videos had helped them navigate personal situations related to the video theme and engaged in peer-support amongst users. This suggests that sex edutainment influencers may be able to act as health influencers by creating a digital peer-educator relationship with their audience.

Some users share YouTube sex edutainment content with their friends, family members and professional network, providing potential for peer education and additional dissemination.

Commenters on videos suggested that content had helped them fill in the gaps where their sex education had been unsatisfactory, including around LGBTQ+ issues.
However this varied between influencers and some influencers received disproportionate trolling or distrust. Audiences were also willing to dispute what they believed to be incorrect information, this highlighted occasional factual inaccuracies in the information presented but became complex for more political topics such as gender, consent or intersex conditions. The most common negative reaction to influencers related to cultural narratives of 'you shouldn't be talking about this'. Yet, trolling and other communication within the comments raise concerns about how much of a safe space public online environments like YouTube can be.

However, there are additional challenges for YouTube sex edutainment influencers in managing moderation of their comments, funding, and the demonetisation of content, and some audience resistance. Platform governance enacted by YouTube and their algorithms meant that the majority of content in this niche is blocked for young people under the age of 18.
At present public health and educational organisations do not appear to be fully utilising the opportunity to partner with YouTube sex edutainment influencers to make use of the positive potential of their health influence. These organisations may be able to help bridge the gaps caused by platform governance by providing sponsorship of content and a trusted seal of approval that content is accurate.

Although the walkthrough identified that YouTube’s policy and algorithmic structures intend to protecting their community from inappropriate content, algorithms can enforce oppressive power structures. Algorithms do not operate in a social vacuum, they learn from the human patterns they observe and the ‘training’ they receive from platform governance, and in doing so can reveal uncomfortable truths about wider perceptions in our society. Thus the obstacle for sex education dissemination lies beyond the specific governance of a single platform and is rooted in the culture that pervades it. Repackaging sex education content into a new platform does not offer an immediate solution to the deeply pervasive cultural narratives around sex and young people that have historically limited the teaching around sex education. The development of any sex education intervention, particularly those that relate to minors, needs to recognise the challenges arising from discourses around sex, risk, and protectionist narratives, and this tracing of connections around YouTube sex edutainment has identified that YouTube is no different as these narratives also permeate our digital environments.

Plans for future work, to find solutions to the challenges identified in this study in order to utilise the promising opportunity for sex edutainment influencers to act as health influencers, are currently in development. If you are interested in this research please get in touch at L.J.Garwood-Cross@salford.ac.uk