People might debate whether it's a chicken or egg effect, but it's often taken for granted that men who watch a lot of porn are more likely to hold hostile, retrograde, or sexist views of women. Yet new research links watching porn with more positive views toward gender equality.
The study, published in The Journal of Sex Research, was conducted by researchers at the University of Western Ontario. "According to radical feminist theory, pornography serves to further the subordination of women by training its users, males and females alike, to view women as little more than sex objects over whom men should have complete control," they wrote in the study abstract.
Yet after comparing people who watch porn with those who don't, researchers found those who had watched an adult film at least once in the past year held more egalitarian ideas about women in positions of power and women working outside the home, along with more positive views toward abortion. The two groups did not differ significantly in attitudes about "traditional" families or self-identification as feminist.
"Taken together, the results of this study fail to support the view that pornography is an efficient deliverer of 'women-hating ideology,'" study authors concluded. "While unexpected from the perspective of radical feminist theory, these results are consistent with a small number of empirical studies that have also reported positive associations between pornography use and egalitarian attitudes."
Researchers relied on data collected between 1975 and 2010 for the General Social Survey, which asks Americans about a wide range of social issues and personal views (including gender equality and personal pornography consumption). For both men and women, viewing porn was associated with more positive attitudes toward women holding positions of power, less negative views of abortion, and less negative attitudes toward women in the workplace.
However, researchers have several caveats. When factors such as gender and survey year are controlled for, "pornography use is only weakly associated with less negative attitudes toward egalitarianism," they note, and—while statistically reliable—this link "may have little real-world meaning." The authors also caution that "no cause-and-effect statements are warranted or implied" here and a third variable most likely accounts for the association. For instance, certain religious beliefs may be linked to a rejection of both porn and gender equality.
Justin Lehmiller, a sex and psychology researchers at Ball State University, analyzed the study at Playboy, noting that it's consistent with findings from a recent meta-review exploring the link between porn and sexual violence. That study, published in Aggression and Violent Behavior, "did not find that adult content was linked to increased rates of rape and sexual assault—rather, the data supported the reverse association," points out Lehmiller.
"These findings do not rule out the idea that there may be negative effects for some men who watch certain types of porn," he added. "For instance, among men who are low in the personality trait of agreeableness (i.e., guys who don't show much care or concern for others), pornography exposure appears to increase their sexist attitudes." Still, these sorts of effects seem to be the exception, not the rule.
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