Watching violent online pornography is linked to poorer sexual health

Young adults who watch violent online pornography tend to report worse sexual well-being, lower empathy, and more acceptance of violence against women than those who watch nonviolent content. These patterns, which look different for men and women, suggest that the specific types of sexual media people consume might shape their interpersonal relationships and physical experiences. The research was published in the journal Behavioral Sciences.

The World Health Organization defines sexual health as a broad state of physical, emotional, and social well-being. This definition goes beyond the mere absence of disease to include psychosocial skills that help people form healthy relationships. Two of these foundational skills are empathy, which involves understanding and sharing the feelings of another person, and sexual assertiveness.

Sexual assertiveness refers to a person’s ability to communicate their desires, initiate wanted encounters, and refuse unwanted sexual activity. Higher levels of this skill protect against sexual coercion and encourage safer sexual practices. Empathy also plays a role in sexual health by fostering mutual satisfaction and reducing the likelihood of aggressive behaviors.

While people consume large amounts of online pornography, research on how different types of explicit media relate to sexual well-being remains mixed. Prior studies often grouped all pornography together, masking how specific content might correlate with different outcomes. Psychological models of media consumption suggest that the consequences of watching pornography depend heavily on the specific context and material viewed.

In recent years, highly accessible online platforms have exposed young viewers to increasingly extreme content during their formative years. To address the knowledge gap regarding specific content, public health researcher Belén Sanz-Barbero from Spain’s National School of Public Health and her colleagues investigated how different forms of violent pornography associate with various dimensions of sexual health.

The researchers organized a large online survey of 3,607 young adults living in Spain between the ages of 18 and 35. For their primary analysis, they isolated a subgroup of 1,985 individuals who reported being sexually active and having watched pornography in the past year. This final group included 1,249 men and 736 women.

The participants answered detailed questionnaires regarding their pornography viewing habits and sexual experiences. To avoid social desirability bias, the tendency for survey respondents to answer questions in a way that will be viewed favorably by others, the researchers avoided using extreme words like rape. Instead, they provided subtle descriptions of sexual encounters and asked participants to rate how often they watched those specific scenarios.

The researchers then categorized the participants based on the most extreme type of pornography they regularly consumed. The three categories were pornography with no explicit violence, pornography featuring degrading or humiliating acts without physical violence, and pornography featuring physical violence. Degrading content included scenes featuring insults, threats, or domination practices that did not inflict physical pain.

Physically violent content included depictions of nonconsensual acts, the use of force, or painful submission practices. The survey instrument also measured the participants’ empathy, sexual assertiveness, and acceptance of violence against women. Additional sections of the questionnaire asked respondents about their sexual satisfaction, their ability to reach orgasm, and whether they had been recently diagnosed with any sexually transmitted infections.

The researchers found that consuming violent pornography was widespread among the study participants. More than 63 percent of the men and nearly 51 percent of the women reported watching pornography that contained physical violence. Men who watched these physically violent videos scored lower on psychological tests measuring empathy and sexual assertiveness compared to men who watched nonviolent pornography.

Both men and women who watched physically violent pornography demonstrated a higher acceptance of violence against women. Men who watched degrading or humiliating content also showed this increased acceptance. The researchers noticed distinct differences between men and women regarding physical sexual function and interpersonal satisfaction.

Men who watched physically violent content were more likely to report enjoying and having fun during sexual activities than those watching nonviolent videos. At the same time, these men were more likely to report feeling discomfort during real world sexual encounters. They also experienced greater difficulty getting or maintaining an erection and were much more likely to use sexual enhancement drugs.

Past studies have shown that the prevalence of erectile dysfunction in men under 40 has increased in recent decades. The researchers proposed that unrealistic sexual fantasies created by violent pornography might cause feelings of distress or moral incongruence when they are not fulfilled in real life. This distress could ultimately interfere with physical sexual function and satisfaction.

For women, watching physically violent pornography was associated with a higher likelihood of struggling to reach orgasm when with a partner. However, these women did not report this same difficulty when experiencing sexual activity alone. The researchers proposed that unrealistic expectations created by violent media might make it harder for viewers to communicate their boundaries or achieve satisfaction with real partners.

The survey also tracked recent diagnoses of sexually transmitted infections like gonorrhea, human papillomavirus, and chlamydia. Individuals of both sexes who watched violent pornography reported higher rates of these recent infections. However, the differences were not statistically significant after the researchers adjusted the data for other demographic variables.

Because this research relied on a survey administered at a single point in time, it cannot prove that watching violent pornography causes these negative sexual health outcomes. The relationship might work in the opposite direction. For example, individuals who already struggle with low empathy or sexual dysfunction might seek out more extreme or violent material to achieve sexual arousal.

The psychological theory of empathy suggests that media consumers often identify with one specific actor in a scene, leading to an empathetic disconnection from the other people involved. It is possible that men with naturally lower empathy are drawn to media that allows them to disconnect from the experiences of women. Women might possess a greater emotional resilience to the effects of violent pornography due to different patterns of empathetic identification.

The survey also depended on participants accurately and honestly reporting their viewing habits. Even with built-in statistical adjustments for social desirability, people might naturally underreport socially unacceptable behaviors and overreport positive traits. The researchers also noted that their sample focused heavily on sexually active individuals, which might limit how well the findings apply to broader populations.

Future longitudinal studies tracking viewers over several years will help determine whether exposure to violent pornography directly alters psychosocial development. Until then, public health interventions targeting young adults could focus on building communication skills and critical thinking regarding the sexual scripts modeled in digital media. Recognizing violent pornography as an emerging factor in sexual health could help educators promote safer and more respectful relationships.

The findings offer a new perspective on how digital media habits align with physical and emotional well-being. The study, “Violent Content in Online Pornography Is Associated with Sexual Health of Women and Men,” was authored by Belén Sanz-Barbero, Vanesa Pérez-Martínez, Ana Rico, Laura Otero-García, Marta Fernández-López, Ariadna Cerdán-Torregrosa, and Carmen Vives-Cases.