Internet pornography and the cultivation of violence against women Flashcards
What is the economic value of the industry?
97 billion dollar industry, 12 billion coming from the US
Porn sites received more website traffic in the US than
Twitter, Instagram, Netflix, Pinterest and Linked-in combined
How many centuries of porn has been consumed on pornhub in 2019
6650 centuries of porn
What is MindGeek?
MindGeek is the parent company of PH, and also own advertising service entity ‘trafficjunky’ who had 4.6 billion daily ad impressions
Why was pornhub banned?
Blocking service provision in some US states due to age restrictions
insta banned ph in sept 2022 due to child exploitation material
What started this passion for porn?
Technological developments in the 80s?
- Video graphics array (digital photographic images to be rendered on computers)
- Hard drives (storage of personal files)
- Computers were networked (distribute porn)
The Triple A engine (Cooper 1988) that increased porn use
Accessibility (millions of sites available 24/7)
Affordability (competition keeps prices low or free)
Anonymity (people perceive their communications to be anonymous)
What were the worldwide traffic changes like?
Big spike at the declaration of a pandemic.
Searches for Corona Virus on pornhub first appeared Jan 25th and continued to rise with a peak increase of 24.4% on March when they offered free Premium access in multiple countries.
What happened when ph offered premium free?
Increase in porn use was observed (only 1 day after free premium access) with substantial increases in Italy (57%), France (38%) and Spain (61%)
What did Wang (2020) find out about covid and lockdown
Increase in social isolation, loneliness and stress
What did Mestre-Bach et al 2020 find out about people wht existing porn use
People with problematic porn use may also relapse to porn use - feeling powerless, hopeless and disconnected from support programs.
How was widespread coronavirus correlated with porn searches?
Sharp increase in porn searches was seen in nations where corona was widespread (Zatoni 2020)
What were the high use of porn associations found?
Sexual arousal and enhancement, links with coping, emotional avoidance and boredom.
How many heterosexual porn encounters involve condom use - as found by Gormon 2010
only 2-3% of heterosexual porn accounters
What is it a public health concern?
Sexual socialization of young people by influencing their understanding of what sexual behaviours are normative, acceptable and rewarding (when they are often depicting behaviours many adults do not see as enjoyable, and are often high risk)
How does porn affect sexual development (Peter and Valkenburg)
Positive correlation between perceived realism of internet porn and degree of influence on an individual’s sexual development.
How did porn consumption of heterosexual men affect desire to engage in… (Wright 2014)
Interest and frequency of consumption of IP was associated with men’s desire to engage in, of have engaged in behaviours such as hair pulling, slapping, choking and verbal use.
How does consumption of IP influence the sexual objectification of women:
- instrumentalisation or division of a woman’s body, body parts or sexual functions from personhood (Fredrickson and Roberts)
- prioritising female genitalia in IP, often in exclusion of female actor’s face (Fritz and Paul 2017)
- ip depicts women as entities whose primary function is male sexual gratification
- men depicted as socially powerful and physically violent = reinforces assumptions about gendered sexual behaviour (fredrickson and Roberts)
What is the link between IP and violence against women –> and outline the meta-analysis from Wright, Tokunga and Kraus 2015)
- IP normalises sex acts that most women do not enjoy (can be degrading, painful or violating)
Meta-analysis gathering data from 22 studies across 7 countries:
- consumption of IP associated with sexual aggression among both males and females (in both cross sectional and longitudinal studies)
- stronger for verbal than physical sexual aggression
What are the theoretical underpinnings of media violence link?
Cognitive: Priming Theory (berkowtiz) - where violent media activates / primes other aggressive thoughts (greater willingness to use violence in interpersonal situations)
Social Learning theory: young children imitating any specific behaviours they see, including aggressive acts in media (Bandura)
Social learning and Behaviour: Connection between observation and behaviour acquired through 3 social cognitive structures
–> schemas about a hostile world
–> script for solving social problem that focus on aggression
–> normative beliefs that aggression is acceptable
Outline the General Aggression Model (Bushman and Anderson)
- factors in immediate situation (being insulted) combine with individual factors (beliefs about using aggression to solve problems)
- combine to produce internal set of aggression related affect, cognition and arousal
- leads to appraisal and decision process of either taking thoughtful or impulsive action
Short term increases in aggressive behaviour following repeated violent media exposure due to
priming
mimicking
arousal changes
long term increases in aggressive behaviour following repeated violent media exposure due to
observational learning
desensitisation of emotional processes (i.e. the more violent porn people are watching, the more they have to ‘up the ante’ to get the same arousal)
What is the gender schema theory?
How children acquire sex-defined characteristics
- through understanding of socially dominant definitions of male and female roles
- physical maturing and socio cultural context defines how to evaluate and handle these changes and prompts development of social and sexual selves to be congruent with socially prevailing gender roles
Sexual script theory? (learning and behaviour)
3 components to understanding media effects on behaviour: acquisition of behavioural scripts, their activation and application
Acquisition effect: when an observer learns a new behavioural script not previously aware (IP offers opportunities to acquire new sexual scripts about female desire, aggression and malleability of consent)
Activation: of script when media exposure provides a cue for retrieval (activation can occur with stimuli other than the original media source of the script, such as arousal)
Others say personality is the reason for the link between aggression and violent media
- social violence is falling but violent media is increasing (this is seen to make sense at face value but has flaws)
–> nearly all research is about everyday aggression not severe acts of violence
–> moderate aggression and violence are always multifactorial
Vocal minority disagrees about hte GAM theory
suggest the GAM theory doesn’t adequately allow for individual differences of biology / personality - but detailed applications of GAM clearly factor in these !
they also suggest small effect sizes are are not meaningful
- but many smaller psychological effects are very important
- and media violence exposure alone is neither necessary nor sufficient to cause moderately aggressive or violent behaviour
What are the favourite times to watch porn
- 4pm spike (students watching porn)
- 11pm
Average hours of teens spent online and on IP
- teens spend average of 15 hours online (males more)
- most of free mainstream IP sites have no barriers to minors
What are the prevalence rates of intentional and unintentional IP exposure to children
Intentional: US study found 7% of 10-17 year olds, and 59% of Taiwanese 10-12th grade students
Unintentional: 19% of 10-12 year olds in the US, to 60% among Australian girls and 84% among australian boys aged 16=17
Average first exposure was 11 year olds, with 100% of 15 year old males and 15% of females reporting they have been exposed to violent porn
Prevalence in the UK
11-16 year olds - at least half had been exposed to IP, almost all by the age of 15
- and that 40% of 13-14s had said that IP had given them ideas about the type of sex to try out
Our Watch (2018) survey of 2000 young Australians aged 15-20 found:
Median age for first seeing porn was 13 for boys, 16 for girls.
78% previously seen porn (boys more likely to have actively looked for it on first exposure compared to girls)
56% boys viewed porn at least once a week in past 12 months, 17% indicating daily viewing
15% girls reported weekly usage, 1% indicating daily viewing
PHD: Theoretical Review q
Consumption of IP represents a risk factor in perpetration of aggression and violence against women as depictions of violence may contribute to real world aggression.
- IP as a ‘zone of cultural exception’ - perpetration of degradation against women are eroticizsed and celebrated, despite being considered antisocial irl
- objectification and dehumanization of women, with moral disengagement
PHD: Early exposure
Most male (57.3%) and female (33.7%) recalled their first exposure to IP between 12-14 years old.
22.8% and 23.7% recalled exposure between 9-11 years
Bernstein: high ip viewing freq, positive affective responses, elevated impulsivity and endorsement of ip related beliefs associated with problematic ip viewing
IP viewing motivations…
Linked to mood management or emotional avoidance were associated with problematic IP viewing.
sexual sensation seeking, adversarial sex beliefs, moral disengagement –> associated with adoption of sexual behaviours consistent with those in porn
What are environment and person factors that might lead to being more susceptible to development of problematic ip viewing?
- associations found between problematic ip viewing, stereotypical gendered attitudes, ip-congruent beliefs (endorsing sexual coercion)
and higher levels of sexual impulsivity, depression,etc
Why do others htink it matters?
Early and more freq exposure to pron is associated with initiation of sex behaviours at younger ages. (Brown)
Young people report using IP as sexual education.
1/5 of daily porn users had depressive symptoms (correlation)
Increased self-objectification and body surveillance related to use of IP for both genders
Exposure of violence against women in media linked with: reduced sympathy for fem victims, increased rape myth acceptance, attitudes in support of sexual violence, stereotypical gender role attitudes, aggression toward women
2021 National Community Attitudes towards violence against women:
25% of respondents strongly or somewhat agree that a man may not realise a woman does not want to have sex if he is very sexually aroused.
21% of respondents agreed that a woman who sends her partner a naked picture of herself is partly responsible if the partner then shares the image without her consent. (revenge porn)
IP and young people - Australian Child Maltreatment Study
- Australian CSA prevalence was 28.5%
- prevalence of perps was mostly other known adolescents (10%), followed by parents (7.8%)
this abuse by other adolescence has increased
- sexualisation of adolescence
- increasing exposure to porn
- young women’s growing awareness of coercion = increased reporting
How to address this issue?
- Education! Lovebites, consent labs, etc
- The Aus Curriculum Version 9 ensure students receive more explicit education on positive and respectful relationships and consent
BUT - currently no universally taught IP education programs in Australian schools
- when a porn literacy program finally made it to a school, it was very well received (peer led)
and government funding has been announced for this
