https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9961-9174
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ABSTRACT
Motivations for pornography use may vary across gender identities, sexual orientations, and geographical regions, warranting examination to promote individual and public health. The aims of this study were to validate the Pornography Use Motivations Scale (PUMS) in a diverse, multicultural sample, and develop a short form (PUMS-8) that can assess a wide range of pornography use motivations. Using data from 42 countries (N = 75,117; Mage = 32.07; SDage = 12.37), enabled us to thoroughly evaluate the dimensionality, validity, and reliability of the Pornography Use Motivations Scale (PUMS), leading to the development of the more concise PUMS-8 short scale. Additionally, language-, nationality-, gender-, and sexual-orientation-based measurement invariance tests were conducted to test the comparability across groups. Both the PUMS and the PUMS-8 assess eight pornography use motivations, and both demonstrated excellent psychometric properties. Sexual Pleasure emerged as the most frequent motivation for pornography use across countries, genders, and sexual orientations, while differences were observed concerning other motivations (e.g. self-exploration was more prevalent among gender-diverse individuals than men or women). The motivational background of pornography use showed high similarity in the examined countries. Both the PUMS and the PUMS-8 are reliable and valid measurement tools to assess different types of motivations for pornography use across countries, genders, and sexual orientations. Both scales are recommended for use in research and clinical settings.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Anastasia Lucic for her help with project administration and data collection, and Natasha Zippan, Abu Bakkar Siddique, Anne-Marie Menard, Clara Marincowitz, Club Sexu, Critica, Digital Ethics Center (Skaitmeninės etikos centras), Día a Día, Ed Carty, El Siglo, Jakia Akter, Jayma Jannat Juma, Kamrun Nahar Momo, Kevin Zavaleta, Laraine Murray, L’Avenir de l’Artois, La Estrella de Panamá, La Voix du Nord, Le Parisien, Lithuanian National Radio and Television (Lietuvos nacionalinis radijas ir televizija), Mahfuzul Islam, Marjia Khan Trisha, Md. Rabiul Islam, Md. Shahariar Emon, Miriam Goodridge, Most. Mariam Jamila, Nahida Bintee Mostofa, Nargees Akter, Niamh Connolly, Rafael Goyoneche, Raiyaan Tabassum Imita, Raquel Savage, Ricardo Mendoza, Saima Fariha, SOS Orienta and Colegio de Psicólogos del Perú, Stephanie Kewley, Sumaiya Hassan, Susanne Bründl, Tamim Ikram, Telex.hu, Trisha Mallick, Tushar Ahmed Emon, Wéo, Yasmin Benoit for their help with recruitment and data collection.
Disclosure Statement
Dr. Potenza discloses that he has consulted for and advised Game Day Data, Addiction Policy Forum, AXA, Idorsia, and Opiant Therapeutics; received research support from the Mohegan Sun Casino, Children and Screens and the Connecticut Council on Problem Gambling; consulted for or advised legal and gambling entities on issues related to impulse control, internet use and addictive behaviors; provided clinical care related to impulse-control and addictive behaviors; performed grant reviews; edited journals/journal sections; given academic lectures in grand rounds, CME events and other clinical/scientific venues; and generated books or chapters for publishers of mental health texts. The University of Gibraltar receives funding from the Gibraltar Gambling Care Foundation, an independent, not-for-profit charity. ELTE Eötvös Loránd University receives funding from Szerencsejáték Ltd. (the gambling operator of the Hungarian government) to maintain a telephone helpline service for problematic gambling. However, these funding sources are not related to this study, and the funding institution had no role in the study design or the collection, analysis, and interpretation of the data, the writing of the manuscript, or the decision to submit the paper for publication.
Author Contributions
Conceptualization: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Shane W. Kraus, Zsolt Demetrovics, Marc N. Potenza, NA Sungkyunkwan University’s research team, and Beáta Bőthe.
Data curation: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Shane W. Kraus, Zsolt Demetrovics, Marc N. Potenza, Émilie Gaudet, Rafael Ballester-Arnal, Dominik Batthyány, Sophie Bergeron, Joël Billieux, Peer Briken, Julius Burkauskas, Georgina Cárdenas-López, Joana Carvalho, Jesús Castro-Calvo, Yun-Hsuan Chang, Lijun Chen, Giacomo Ciocca, Ornella Corazza, Rita I. Csako, David P. Fernandez, Hironobu Fujiwara, Elaine F. Fernandez, Johannes Fuss, Roman Gabrhelík, Ateret Gewirtz-Meydan, Biljana Gjoneska, Mateusz Gola, Joshua B. Grubbs, Hashim T. Hashim, Yi-Ping Hsieh, Md. Saiful Islam, Mustafa Ismail, Martha C. Jiménez-Martínez, Tanja Jurin, Ondrej Kalina, Verena Klein, András Költő, Sang-Kyu Lee, Karol Lewczuk, Christine Lochner, Silvia López-Alvarado, Kateřina Lukavská, Percy Mayta-Tristán, Dan J. Miller, Oľga Orosová, GáborOrosz, Fernando P. Ponce, Gonzalo R. Quintana, Gabriel C. Quintero Garzola, Jano Ramos-Diaz, KévinRigaud, Ann Rousseau, Marco De TubinoScanavino, Marion K. Schulmeyer, PratapSharan, Mami Shibata, Sheikh Shoib, Vera Sigre-Leirós, Luke Sniewski, OgnenSpasovski, VestaSteibliene, Dan J. Stein, Julian Strizek, AlexandarŠtulhofer, NA Sungkyunkwan University’s research team, Berk C. Ünsal, Marie-Pier Vaillancourt-Morel, Marie Claire Van Hout, and BeátaBőthe.
Formal analysis: Mónika Koós, Émilie Gaudet, and Beáta Bőthe.
Funding acquisition: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Shane W. Kraus, Zsolt Demetrovics, Roman Gabrhelík, Karol Lewczuk, and Beáta Bőthe.
Investigation: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Shane W. Kraus, Zsolt Demetrovics, Marc N. Potenza, Émilie Gaudet, Rafael Ballester-Arnal, Dominik Batthyány, Sophie Bergeron, Joël Billieux, Peer Briken, Julius Burkauskas, Georgina Cárdenas-López, Joana Carvalho, Jesús Castro-Calvo, Yun-Hsuan Chang, Lijun Chen, Giacomo Ciocca, Ornella Corazza, Rita I. Csako, David P. Fernandez, Hironobu Fujiwara, Elaine F. Fernandez, Johannes Fuss, Roman Gabrhelík, Ateret Gewirtz-Meydan, Biljana Gjoneska, Mateusz Gola, Joshua B. Grubbs, Hashim T. Hashim, Yi-Ping Hsieh, Md. Saiful Islam, Mustafa Ismail, Martha C. Jiménez-Martínez, Tanja Jurin, Ondrej Kalina, Verena Klein, András Költő, Sang-Kyu Lee, Karol Lewczuk, Christine Lochner, Silvia López-Alvarado, Kateřina Lukavská, Percy Mayta-Tristán, Dan J. Miller, Oľga Orosová, GáborOrosz, Fernando P. Ponce, Gonzalo R. Quintana, Gabriel C. Quintero Garzola, Jano Ramos-Diaz, KévinRigaud, Ann Rousseau, Marco De TubinoScanavino, Marion K. Schulmeyer, PratapSharan, Mami Shibata, Sheikh Shoib, Vera Sigre-Leirós, Luke Sniewski, OgnenSpasovski, VestaSteibliene, Dan J. Stein, Julian Strizek, AlexandarŠtulhofer, NA Sungkyunkwan University’s research team, Berk C. Ünsal, Marie-Pier Vaillancourt-Morel, Marie Claire Van Hout, and BeátaBőthe.
Methodology: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Shane W. Kraus, Zsolt Demetrovics, Marc N. Potenza, and Beáta Bőthe.
Project administration: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Émilie Gaudet, and Beáta Bőthe.
Resources: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Shane W. Kraus, Zsolt Demetrovics, Marc N. Potenza, Roman Gabrhelík, Biljana Gjoneska, Karol Lewczuk, Kateřina Lukavská, Gabriel C. Quintero Garzola, Jano Ramos-Diaz, and Beáta Bőthe.
Software: Mónika Koós and Beáta Bőthe.
Supervision: Beáta Bőthe.
Validation: Mónika Koós, Léna Nagy, Shane W. Kraus, Zsolt Demetrovics, Marc N. Potenza, and Beáta Bőthe.
Visualization: Mónika Koós.
Writing – original draft: Mónika Koós and Émilie Gaudet.
Writing – review & editing: Mónika Koós, Sophie Bergeron, Peer Briken, Yun-Hsuan Chang, David P. Fernandez, Roman Gabrhelík, Ateret Gewirtz-Meydan, Mateusz Gola, Yi-Ping Hsieh, András Költő, Karol Lewczuk, Christine Lochner, Kateřina Lukavská, Dan J. Miller, Fernando P. Ponce, Gonzalo R. Quintana, Marco De Tubino Scanavino, Vera Sigre-Leirós, Dan J. Stein, Alexandar Štulhofer, Marie-Pier Vaillancourt-Morel, Marie Claire Van Hout, and Beáta Bőthe.
Ethics
The authors assert that all procedures contributing to this work comply with the relevant national and institutional committees’ ethical standards on human experimentation and the Helsinki Declaration. The study received approval either from the national/institutional ethics review boards of all participating countries or from the local ethics committees, which determined that the study was exempt and did not require additional assessment since it had already been approved by the ethics committees of the principal investigators’ institutions:
Supplementary Material
Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00224499.2024.2359641
Notes
1 Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, and Romania were included in the study protocol paper as collaborating countries (Bőthe, Koós, et al., Citation2021); however, it was not possible to get ethical approval for the study in a timely manner in these countries. Therefore, these countries did not participate in the data collection. Chile was not included in the study protocol paper as a collaborating country (Bőthe, Koós, et al., Citation2021) as the Chilean research team joined the study after publishing the study protocol.
2 Test statistics for the PU motivations are the following: (H(32) = 5196.986, p < .001) of the Sexual Pleasure (SP), (H(32) = 4561.88, p < .001) for the Sexual Curiosity (SC), (H(32) = 2224.746, p < .001) for the Fantasy (FA), (H(32) = 3938.663, p < .001) for the Boredom Avoidance (BA), (H(32) = 4478.839, p < .001) for the Lack of Sexual Satisfaction (LS), (H(32) = 3541.582, p < .001) for the PUMS Emotional Distraction (ED), (H(32) = 4190.64, p < .001) for the Stress Reduction (SR) and (H(32) = 2035.924, p < .001) for the Self-Exploration (SE) PU motivations.