White characters during the fall 2002 prime-time season accounted for the vast majority of screen time for characters of all races while Latino characters barely appeared on television, according to the second-year findings of a UCLA study tracking diversity on television.

White characters accounted for 81 percent of screen time, according to the study entitled “Prime Time in Black and White: Not Much Is New for 2002.� Whites appeared on television for 224 hours out of 276 hours of screen time for all characters.

African-American characters accounted for about 41 hours of screen time, or about 15 percent of screen time, the study showed. Latino characters accounted for seven hours, or 3 percent of screen time, while Asian Americans accounted for four hours, or 1 percent of screen time.

“Despite our nation’s growing diversity, white characters continue to dominate prime time, not only with the number of characters but also with the amount of time they appear on the television screen,� said Darnell Hunt, the study’s principal author, sociologist and director of the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies at UCLA. “Latinos characters are significantly underrepresented in terms of screen time.�

The research was based on a content analysis of 234 episodes of 85 situation comedies and dramas airing on ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, UPN and The WB during three weeks in October and November.

Other study findings also show that little progress has been made in diversifying prime-time television, Hunt said.

African Americans and whites represented 90 percent of prime-time characters, yet they comprise about 81 percent of the nation’s population, according to the study. They represented 92 percent of characters during the 2001 prime-time season.

In contrast, Latinos continued to be the most underrepresented group in prime-time television despite being the nation’s largest minority group, the study showed. Latinos accounted for 3 percent of characters, a slight increase from 2 percent in 2001. However, Latinos make up 13 percent of the nation’s population.


In terms of the overall number of characters, Asian Americans seemed to be approaching proportionate representation in prime-time television, the study showed. Researchers found that Asian Americans represented about 3 percent of all characters while accounting for about 4 percent of the population.

Native Americans were again invisible, according to the study.

The study also found that prime-time television continues to present a male-dominated world. For whites and African Americans, nearly 63 percent of all characters were men. For Latinos, the figure was 56 percent. Women outnumber men only among Asian Americans. Asian-American women accounted for 53 percent of characters among that ethnic group compared with 47 percent of Asian-American men.

Racial representation continued to vary by network, according to the study. White characters were most overrepresented on The WB and NBC. They accounted for 83 percent on The WB and 81 percent on NBC. Non-Latino whites make up 69 percent of the nation’s population.

African Americans continue to be the most overrepresented on UPN, Hunt said. They account for 31 percent of all characters on UPN, despite making up about 12 percent of the nation’s population.

While not as pronounced as in previous years, UPN’s Monday-night situation comedies continue to account for a disproportionate share of central African-American characters, according to the study. Of the 125 African-American characters appearing on prime-time television on Monday nights, 112 appeared on UPN, accounting for 90 percent of African-American characters on network television on that night. Moreover, four of the five shows with the highest percentage of African-American characters constitute UPN’s Monday-night line-up.

According to Hunt, the study showed that “the industry continues to be driven by business logics that divide the nation into market segments based on race, where the large but declining white segment reigns supreme.�

Hunt noted that programs designed to reach the other groups, particularly African-American viewers, were “relegated to a particular night or two, and often concentrated on one of the smaller networks, if at all.�

“This tendency is problematic,� Hunt said. “Although it may unfortunately reflect the current reality of American race relations with startling clarity, it also works to reinforce that reality by splintering the diverse cultural forum of televised experiences that we might otherwise share across groups.�

“Prime-time television is about much more than just the business of entertainment,� Hunt added. “It is one of the primary cultural vehicles through which we imagine the type of society we would like to have, that we believe may be possible.�