Self-Assessed Effects of Pornography Use on Personal Sex Life: Results from a Large-Scale Study of Norwegian Adults

Abstract

Objectives: The study explored characteristics associated with the self-assessed effects of pornography use on one’s personal sex life. Methods: Data were collected in a probability-based sample of Norwegian adults (n = 4,160). Results: Most participants (41.3%) did not believe that pornography affected their sex life. More participants reported positive (33.2%) than mixed/negative (25.5%) effects of pornography use. Sociodemographic and sexual characteristics that predicted these self-assessments were examined. Among participants in a steady relationship, emotional intimacy and relationship satisfaction were unrelated to the self-assessed effects. Conclusions: The current study findings add to scant literature about the self-assessed effects of pornography usage.

Keywords:

• Pornography
• sexually explicit material
• self-assessed effects
• impact of pornography use

Notes

1 When included participants were compared to those excluded, the former were significantly more likely to be men (χ²(1) = 645.16, Ф = .40, p < .001), of younger age (t = 15.06, df = 3274.59, d = .48, p < .001), not religious (χ²(1) = 98.27, Ф = .16, p < .001,), and non-exclusively heterosexual (χ²(1) = 36.06, Ф = .10, p < .001).

2 See https://www.ssb.no/en/utdanning/statistikker/utniv.

3 See https://kantar.no/om/norsk-gallup/right-of-privacy/

4 Intentional pornography use was assessed using the following question “You may have seen pornography more or less randomly, e.g., on a cover of a magazine or a film. Likewise, you may have seen pornographic images in educational material related to sexuality, in news articles, etc. Apart from this, have you ever seen pornography?”.

5 In the subsample of participants who were married or in a relationship, 40.8% reported no effect, 34.5% reported positive and 24.7% reported mixed/negative effect of pornography use on their personal sex life.

Additional information

Funding

This work was financially supported by the Department of Psychology, University of Oslo.