ilip Zimbardo, Ph.D., and Mel Ganus, Ed.D.
PORNOGRAPHY
Is Porn Good for Us or Bad for Us?
New research suggests watching porn may lead to some undesirable consequences.
Posted March 1, 2016 Reviewed by Lybi Ma
KEY POINTS
- Researchers have found that repeated porn use "wears out" the dopamine reward system in the brain.
- A German study shows that some porn users become dependent on new, surprising, or more extreme porn to get aroused.
- Some men report that their level of concentration and emotional well-being have been negatively affected by porn use.
People continue to ask the same questions about porn that they have for decades: Is porn good for us or bad for us? Is it immoral or is it empowering? Damaging or liberating? Asking these questions inevitably leads to an intense clashing of opinions and little else.
One question that is not being asked: What is porn doing to us and are we OK with that? There is a growing body of research that says watching porn may lead to some not so desirable individual and social outcomes both in the short- and long term.
Escalating porn compulsion and correlations in the brain
Some people can watch porn occasionally and not suffer significant side effects; however, plenty of people out there, including teens and pre-teens with highly plastic brains, find they are compulsively using high-speed internet porn with their tastes becoming out of sync with their real-life sexuality.
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