Association Between Pornography Use, Sexism, and Sexual Violence Myth Acceptance in Chinese Men: The Moderating Effect of Perceived Realism

ABSTRACT

Pornography is spreading more and more widely due to websites, applications, and social media. It has attracted the attention of a large number of researchers who are sometimes divided on the impact of pornography. However, the relationship between pornography and sexual violence myths has received little scholarly attention in China. Based on the ₃AM model and previous research, the study examined hostile sexism (HS) as a mediator and perceived realism as a moderator in the links between pornography use frequency and sexual violence myths in a sample of Chinese men (N = 376). The results showed that although pornography use and sexual violence myths did not directly correlate with one another, there was an indirect correlation through HS. Further, perceived realism moderated the relationship between pornography use frequency and HS. When participants’ perceived realism was high (i.e. +1 SD), the indirect effect of HS was strong; when participants’ perceived realism was low (i.e. −1 SD), the indirect effect of HS was not significant. Taken together, the findings reveal the cross-cultural consistency of the ₃AM theory in China, and the findings provide new insight into the potential impact of pornography on sexism. At the same time, the results suggest an increase in appropriate education and interventions to reduce the incidence of sexual violence.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Availability of data and material

Study data is available upon request.

Code availability

Model code is available upon request.

Consent to participate

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Consent for publication

All the authors have seen and approved the manuscript for publication.

Ethics approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Notes

1. The results for including age and education were similar to those for not including.

Additional information

Funding

This research is sponsored by Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities [SWU2209237] and Chongqing Municipal Training Program of Innovation and Entrepreneurship for Undergraduates [S202310635225].