COMMENTS: Religiosity was a factor in treatment seeking, but only for females – which is probably a small percentage of total females. As expected levels of porn use also related to treatment seeking. Pornography use is on the rise, as are problems related to use.
Abstract
Scope of this project refers to (1) problematic pornography use, (2) addictive symptoms associated with pornography use and (3) treatment seeking due to out-of-control sexual behaviors. The project consists of three studies. For Study 1, changes in indicators of internet pornography prevalence in Polish population between years 2004 and 2016 were analyzed, along with demographic characteristics of internet pornography viewers. This is the first available analysis of online pornography use prevalence based not on declarative, but on objective internet traffic data. Results showed growing popularity of online pornography during analyzed period.
This results, in conjunction with reports of growing number of people seeking treatment due to problematic pornography use and difficulties in controlling their own sexual behaviors, indicates the need of research on mechanisms underlying these problems. Studies 2 and 3 are aimed at this issue and constitute a core of this project. In Studies 2 and 3 people seeking treatment for problematic pornography use were compared to healthy controls.
Analysis showed that treatment-seekers had (1) higher level of negative symptoms associated with addictive sexual behaviors, (2) spent more time on pornography use but also (3) declared higher religiosity, had (4) lower probability of being in an intimate relationship (for males), reported (5) longer period from last dyadic sexual activity (for males) and experienced (6) more severe pornography and masturbation binge periods (for females). The structure of relationships between key variables was also determined, with a focus on predictors of treatment seeking. Time spent on pornography consumption was positively related to probability of seeking treatment.
However, analysis revealed that the strongest predictors of seeking treatment were negative symptoms associated with addictive sexual behaviors (for males and for females) and a variable that was an indicator of religiosity – time spent on religious practices (for females). In the last part of this work, scientific significance of obtained results and implications for therapy of out of control sexual behaviors are discussed.
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