To examine the portrayal of intimate sexual behavior on soap operas 65 hours of programming over 3 seasons was sampled. During 1 week in the winter of 1976 2 episodes of 12 different soap operas (15.5 hours) were videotaped. In the summer of 1979 2 episodes of 13 different soap operas (21 hours) were videotaped. In 1980 3 episodes of each of 11 soap operas (28.5 hours) were coded off the air. In all 3 seasons 10 of the same soap operas were coded. Intimate sexual behavior was defined as explicit or implied acts of sexual intercourse any type of illicit sexual behavior homosexuality or petting. The unit of analysis was the physical or verbal act or reference to 1 of these intimate sexual behavior categories. A unit began with either a physical or verbal display of a category and ended with the completion of the act category a new character entering the scene or a scene change. In addition to coding instances of these content variables the physical and verbal explicitness of each incident was judged as high low or absent. The net changes in rate of occurrence are an increase from 2.00 to 2.28 acts per hour between 1976 and 1979 and a decrease to 1.80 acts per hour in 1980. Petting acts were the most frequently occurring activity overall and the predominant activity in the first 2 analyses. Unmarried partners outnumbered married partners in incidents of and references to intercourse by a ratio of 4 to 1. For the remaining analyses the distribution of petting acts was compared with a collapsed category of the remaining acts labeled "intercourse/all other sexual acts." CBS had comparable rates of petting and all other activity; NBC and ABC had higher rates of the latter. 30-minute shows contained more than 1 additional intimate sexual act or reference overall in each hour of programming than did 60-minute shows and that addition came from increased occurrences of both petting and intercourse/all other sexual acts. Shows broadcast earlier in the afternoon (before 1 p.m. EST) had higher rates in both categories than did shows broadcast later in the afternoon. The intimate sexual acts categories of petting and intercourse did not differ by sex of the participants or by age occupation or marital status either for the initiators or for the targets. Of the petting incidents 35% involved marital partners and 45% involved lovers with the remainder distributed equally among work partners strangers and those planning to marry. Of the incidents of intercourse 49% involved lovers 29% involved strangers and only 6% involved marital partners. A comparison of these results with those from prime-time analysis shows that there is more sex activity and reference to such activity in afternoon programming but the content of the intimacies differs greatly in the afternoon and evening programs.