According to a new study by the Parents Television Council, underage girls are more likely to participate in exploitative scenes on television than adult women. For the study, the PTC studied 238 episodes of prime-time television and found that about two-thirds of them had some sort of sexual content. A third were deemed to have content deemed exploitative. The study also found that while underage kids were more likely to be involved in exploitative scenes, about a third of those scenes were designed to be humorous; but PTC President Tim Winter is not amused.

“Today, the Parents Television Council publicly asks, ‘When is it appropriate to laugh at the sexual exploitation of a child?'” He said in a statement. “How are our children and our society being impacted by entertainment content that utilizes sexual exploitation as humor?” (W2.ParentsTV)

Paul Asay has covered religion for The Washington Post, Christianity Today, Beliefnet.com and The (Colorado Springs) Gazette. He writes about culture for Plugged In and wrote the Batman book God on the Streets of Gotham (Tyndale). He lives in Colorado Springs with wife, Wendy, and his two children. Follow him on Twitter.