news.cnet.com/8301-27083_3-10407102-247.html
bella731/Flickr) Pornography has long been considered to be one of the main motivators of major technological inventions, from the camera to the worldwide Web. Its effects on human health and sexuality have also been, and likely will always be, hotly debated.
University of Montreal suggests that pornography is so widely digested, and with such a seemingly low correlation to "pathological" behavior, that it is grossly over-demonized.
School of Social Work, set out to examine the effects of pornography on men, which would involve studying men in their 20s who've never consumed pornography. Still at an early stage of the study, Lajeunesse has so far recruited 20 heterosexual male university students who, as consumers of pornography, are representative of, well, heterosexual male university students. The objective of the study, he says, "is to observe the impact of pornography on the sexuality of men, and how it shapes their perception of men and women." Subjects shared their sexual history, beginning with their first experience with pornography, which for most boys happens by the age of 10. The research so far shows that 90 percent of pornography is consumed online and 10 percent through video stores. On average, men who are single watch porn about three times a week for about 40 minutes, while men who are in relationships watch about 17 times a week for about 20 minutes. All test subjects report that they support gender equality, and that they feel victimized by rhetoric that demonizes pornography. "Pornography hasn't changed their perception of women or their relationship which they all want as harmonious and fulfilling as possible," Lajeunesse says. "Those who could not live out their fantasy in real life with their partner simply set aside the fantasy. The fantasy is broken in the real world and men don't want their partner to look like a porn star."
"If pornography had the impact that many claim it has, you would just have to show heterosexual films to a homosexual to change his sexual orientation." There are a few obvious problems with this study, beyond its sample population being 20. Lajeunesse is relying on his subjects to report honestly about behavior that, when actually perverse, might rarely be admitted to. Also, there is the question of what should be defined as perverse or deviant. And finally, measuring the effects of porn on sexual behavior before it became so widely available online compared to after seems downright impossible. But still, if watching porn is so widespread, and I have every reason to believe it is, Lajeunesse may have a point about its effects being over-hyped, unless we are all closet basketcases. Whether he will ever be able to prove this definitively, though, is unlikely. Also of note is that this study only sets out to investigate the effects of porn on men. The effect on women, their sexuality, and how they view their own bodies and the desires of their partners is another story altogether.
Elizabeth Armstrong Moore is a freelance journalist based in Portland, Ore. She has contributed to Wired magazine, The Christian Science Monitor, and public radio. Her semi-obscure hobbies include unicycling, slacklining, hula-hooping, scuba diving, billiards, Sudoku, Magic the Gathering, and classical piano. She is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET.
stefanvolos December 1, 2009 3:29 PM PST "averaging 20 to 40 minutes a week"? Obviously, this study's participants were not hooked up to a lie-detector, because if that were truly the case, there would be hardly any porn to be found on the internet.
cyberslick50 December 1, 2009 3:47 PM PST 3 times a week is 40 minutes a week easy, from clicking the link to browsing to Facebook instead afterwards, I'd say on average men don't ********** EVERY day. Plus I wonder if the study even considered "consumption" in those specific terms. People are exposed to all sorts of ponography online without even looking for it.
Maybe as a gay man I have a skewed perception of this, but if men on average don't ****** EVERY day then I must know a bunch of freaks. In relation to the comment at the end of this article about how only focusing on men is a problem with the study. If you were to try and such dynamically different things as the effects of porn on men and the effects of porn on women in a single study your data would be ****. The simple fact that most women don't watch porn (intentionally as said earlier there's unintentional porn exposure online). It's accepted marketing research backed knowledge in the adult industry that women react to different forms of stimuli. That's why there's so much erotica in the world for women. Not to mention that the industry doesn't make porn targeted at women, so of course it's going to have a different effect. Some baseline on the two segments would be nice before we start throwing them together.
slumbergod December 1, 2009 3:39 PM PST Most women I know look at porn online regularly now too. The only people that turn into deviant monsters were probably weirdos already.
vikinzer December 2, 2009 10:47 AM PST As with all things it's about being aware enough of the media you are intaking that it does not have effect you in ways you wouldn't want. Anyone can mindlessly consume media without giving it another thought, and yes it will effect a person's outlooks in unintended ways. If you deal with porn in a healthy manner, such as being aware of your sexuality and sharing your sexual exploration and desires with your parnter/s then it won't cause problems. The adult industry does have a history of exploiting women, and before women's sexual liberation, which many traditional feminists would call quite evil sad to say porn was pretty seedy. If pornographic content shows individuals involved in reasonably, entertaining, equitable sexuality activity (equitable being relative as any BDSM where everyone is playing the role they want to play is still equitable) then there is nothing wrong with it at all. I know there are several cases where women in relationships where men watch porn in secret and then the female partner discovers her hubby/boyfriend/whatever's habit claim it causes huge self worth issues, and body issues, and all sorts of other issues. While the body issues can be a problem that is really more a trust problem. Again if you are honest with your partner about what you are doing and share that part of your sexuality with them then self worth issues are far less likely to pop up.
Random_Walk December 1, 2009 3:49 PM PST "If pornography had the impact that many claim it has, you would just have to show heterosexual films to a homosexual to change his sexual orientation."
Not including Elizabeth's accurate (but understated) critiques of the failings of this this study in method, this statement by the 'researcher' (using that term quite loosely) shows he has the sociological and psychological prowess of a peanut. All this study shows is that Lajeunesse doesn't know what the heck he's doing (other than what kind of research project will make a news splash).
Random_Walk December 2, 2009 1:11 PM PST The article gives the hypothesis of porn being this overbearing controlling influence on an average individual's life. Fact is, it only has the influence that you allow it to.
sbwinn December 1, 2009 4:17 PM PST So, this study clearly demonstrates that an incredibly small sample of 20-something college boys who are sexually active, viewing porn, and not psychopaths are in fact not psychopaths?
joodi3k December 2, 2009 5:37 AM PST I think what happened is they threw up their hands when they realized they couldn't create a control group and just polled the last 20 candidates.
gjl229 December 1, 2009 4:46 PM PST Collecting anecdotes (about all you can do with a cohort of 20 self-selected college students) is not research. Writing about someone collecting anecdotes is not journalism.
joodi3k December 2, 2009 5:39 AM PST There was never going to be research without a control group. In the article, they state that they could not find anyone in that age group who didn't look at porn on a weekly basis.
thebergie December 2, 2009 10...
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