Watching porn has been blamed for shrinking genitals, shrinking brains, divorce, and pedophilia. In April of 2016 the State of Utah, home to the highest rates of pornography consumption in the United States, declared it to be a public health hazard.[1]
People you might not expect have joined the chorus of voices condemning pornography. Former Playboy playmate and sex tapes star Pamela Anderson decried pornography as "potentially corrosive." A royal commission in Scotland warned that watching excessive pornography warned Scottish teenagers that viewing images of adults having sex can lead to impotence. [2] Anti-porn crusaders argue that pornography is addictive in the same way as heroin, hijacking neural pathways so that they can only be satisfied with scenes of bestiality, rape, coercion, and abuse. [3] But is pornography, and satisfying yourself while watching it, really devastating to your sex life with real people?
In Any Given Week, About 50 Percent of Men and 20 Percent of Women View Pornography
According to the Journal of Sex Research, in any given seven-day period 46 period of American men and 16 percent of American women view pornography.[4] However, some studies report even higher rates of porn consumption in Pakistan, Egypt, Vietnam, Iran, Morocco, India, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the Philippines, and Poland, all of which have laws restricting access to sexual imagery, requiring ingenuity to locate the websites that provide it.
Just how all that porn affects the people who view it has only been studied extensively in the United States and United Kingdom, and the studies don't all agree:
- Some scientists believe that the parts of the brain that work differently in porn addicts are the same parts of the brain that work differently in drug addicts. However, the brain imaging studies have mostly been done in people who have a problem with viewing porn compulsively, not with occasional users. It could be that using pornography for self-gratification changes the brain, or that the people who masturbate to porn have different brains in the first place.[5]
- Some studies have found that people who view porn daily are more easily aroused, and some studies have found that people who view porn daily are less easily aroused.[6]
- Some studies have found that rates of impotence in younger men have skyrocketed, from 5 percent to 33 percent, since the advent of Internet pornography about 20 years ago.[7] However, studies at different times have used different definitions of impotence.
READ Do You Suffer From Porn-Induced Sexual Dysfunction?
People Who See Sex Therapists Have Different Issues From Those Who Don't
Many sex therapists report that men under 40 are more likely to report delayed ejaculation, less satisfaction with sex with their sexual partners than with solo masturbation, lower interest in sexual intercourse, and less interest in sexual intercourse in general if they view porn. People who seek mental health help because they escalate their consumption of porn from depictions of common sex acts to S & M, bondage, bestiality, violence, and sex with children probably don't have the same kinds of mental wellness issues as those who don't. But what are the real effects of watching porn on a regular basis?
Don't Let Porn Deprive You of Intimacy in a Relationship
There are some real benefits from masturbation in certain circumstances. When sexual intercourse is just not appropriate, masturbation at least relieves the sex drive. There can also be some real harm from masturbation if it takes the place of a healthy relationship with a real human being.
I'm not going to tell you that watching pornography is in any way good for your sex life. If you are going to have sex, have it with a real human being. If you persist in watching porn, expect your sex life to change in predictable ways.
- Your lover in real life isn't likely to be as physically attractive, immediately available, and agreeable to every suggestion as an actor in a video. On the other hand, an actor in a video isn't going to have a child with you, make you chicken soup when you have a cold, share the mortgage payment, or leave you presents under the Christmas tree. Relationships are usually about more than sex. Your "relationship" with a porn actor or actress is uncomplicated but unrewarding. You lose out if you don't establish real relationships.
- People watch porn until, to put it in a nice way, they reach sexual satisfaction. In a survey of teens who view porn that focused on teenagers who didn't need to seek mental health counseling, the most commonly reported problem among males was premature ejaculation, and the most commonly reported problem among females was difficulty reaching a climax at all. If watching porn, men can climax when they want, and women can continue as long as they want. In real life, the partner's stamina or desire limits these choices. However, in a survey of these sexual health issues, less than 7 percent of young men and less than 6 percent of young women reported these were problems on an ongoing basis.
- Fear of not being able to perform like porn stars, in a roundabout way, leads to teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease, because males who fear they will not be fully erect throughout sex may not wear condoms. Concern for potency is less among couples who do not watch porn.
- Young men may have difficulty reaching ejaculation and orgasm because they are thinking "Is this all there is?" This is less of a problem for those who don't watch porn.
READ Healthy Sexual Relationships: Is Porn Good for Your Sex Life?
- Some people watch porn to get ideas to try out in their sex lives. In one study in the UK, 26 percent of males under the age of 21 and 36 percent of females under 21 had used porn as a tool of sex education in the previous year. With a willing partner, this is not necessarily a bad thing, but if you are watching the film and then looking for someone to try out the sex techniques with later, expectations can be unrealistic. This is, of course, less risky than visiting a sex worker for "instruction," and less expensive than visiting either a sex worker or a sex therapist.
- The majority of people surveyed, however, don't experience more than temporary difficulties in their sex lives, at least before age 21, whether or not they view porn.
If you don't have a sex life that doesn't involve porn, if you are always disappointed with your real-life lovers, or if you have to visit the dark net to satisfy your ever-increasing needs for sexual variety, then you have a problem for which you need professional help. But if you have viewed porn because you were curious, or for ideas to explore with a willing partner you already know, just keep it all in perspective, and focus on having not just a love life but a loving life with a real person.