What Is Pornography?

"Pornography" is derived from the Greek word "pornographos" which means "writing about prostitutes." It is defined at Wordsmyth.com as "written or visual material intended to be sexually stimulating, esp. when void of artistic merit." For purposes of this blog, we aren't concerned about legal definitions, but only about the affect pornography has on individuals and relationships. And just because someone calls it "art" doesn't mean it's suddenly harmless. We'll drop the "esp." part so that porn is defined as "written or visual material intended to be sexually stimulating." Such material is also known as "erotica." The Cambridge International Dictionary of English defines erotica as "books, pictures, etc. which produce sexual desire and pleasure."

A more helpful definition of pornography for your personal use might be based on what pornography does rather than what it is. It's like the duck analogy. If you see something that looks like a duck, swims like a duck, waddles like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then for all practical purposes, it is a duck, no matter what someone else may be calling it. So what is it that pornography does? Well, mostly it just catches your eye and begs you to look. As you look, you feel excitement and sexual pleasure. If you are married, it can make your wife seem relatively less exciting. It might make her feel less appreciated and less loved. We might define it as "any sexually exciting image that causes you to be less romantically satisfied with your wife" or perhaps as "a sexually exciting image of any woman who is not your own mate." Because a given image may affect different men in different ways, and men differ in how sensitive they are to visual stimuli, what is porn to one man may be only a pretty (or uninteresting . . . or repulsive) picture to another. For the most sensitive men, pornography may include almost any view of an attractive woman showing cleavage or in tight or otherwise revealing clothing, and is easily accessible on magazine covers in grocery store checkout lines, in department store clothing advertisements, on television, on billboards, and in most popular movies. Even a relatively innocent image may be a trigger that brings on cravings for more.

Are You Addicted?

As with pornography, a usable definition of "addiction" is based on what addiction does rather than what it is. An addiction causes us to repeatedly seek out and consume the substance to which we are addicted, despite our own best intentions and despite the obvious negative consequences of such consumption. An addiction to pornography may cause a man to do things that he later regrets, costing him his marriage, job, children, self-respect, or freedom. An addiction is a need that forms only after you have used or been exposed to the addictive substance. The need generally decreases gradually and eventually subsides if exposure to the addictive substance stops. Within limits, the more your are exposed to an addictive substance, the more need you feel for it, and the less you are exposed to it, the less need you eventually feel for it. Consequently, one of the keys to overcoming an addiction is to distance yourself from the addictive substance in whatever ways you are able. With time, your need for the substance subsides.

Because we differ in our sensitivities and responses to various types of stimuli, what is addictive to one person may not be to another.

Whether you are struggling with a porn addiction or not, I hope that the ideas on this blog help you to understand how pornography affects a man's brain, and to avoid much of the harmful influence that pornography can have on a marriage.

Why Do We Like To Look?

Why is it so difficult for a man to look away from a sexy image?

The pleasant sexual feelings you get when you see a sexy image have a natural function, but only within marriage. That function is to bring you and your wife together emotionally and physically in a way that strengthens and enlivens your marriage. In a fully functioning marriage, when a woman makes herself appear sexy or behaves in a sexual way for her husband, he is affected in at least three ways.

First, the rush of pleasure he feels at the sexy view reinforces pleasant associations in his brain that make his wife appear more attractive to him even in nonsexual situations, and even as she ages.

Second, these pleasant lustful feelings help him feel and act appreciative and affectionate toward his wife. This extra appreciation and affection in turn increase her desire for physical intimacy and prompt her to give him more affection.

And third, these lustful feelings break down a man's psychological barriers to physical intimacy by weakening his own sense of modesty and personal space, by reducing his natural aversion to touching the intimate areas of another person's body, and by giving him a desire for increased intimacy. They also serve to focus his mind on the present and reduce his ability to weigh long-term consequences (such as the responsibility of possible offspring) of his intentions, thus allowing the perpetuation of the species ("Do pretty women inspire men to discount the future?" M. Wilson and M. Daly, Proc. Biol. Sci. 271:S177–S179. [2004]).

Sexy pictures, on the other hand, are like artificial mind-altering drugs that hijack these same neurological pleasure pathways and abuse their function in such a way that reduces your ability to enjoy natural pleasures, including the pleasure of looking at your own mate. You can read some of my other posts for details.

All of this means that your desire to feel pleasure by looking at a sexy woman is natural and good. That desire can serve to enliven and strengthen your relationship with your wife. The problem is that our visually polluted modern environment exposes you to other women behaving and appearing (to your subconscious) as if they were married to you. The solution is to create a personal environment that is relatively free from such visual pollution, allowing you to more fully enjoy other pleasures in life, including the natural beauty of your present or future mate.

Are The Pictures Real?

With pornography, what you see is not what you get. You can think of the sexiness or glamour of pornographic pictures as a thin artificial film over a less interesting reality. After all of the plastic surgery, makeup, clothing choices, flattering poses, lighting adjustments, soft focus, long photo shoots, photo touch-ups, and marketing, the erotic picture you see may have little resemblance to the real person behind it.

When you see a pornographic image, it is probably not the real person behind the picture, or the skin exposure, or the activity depicted, that is most captivating. It is rather the artificial glamor of the presentation that is seductive. If you could see through the glamor, the reality would be less interesting and less captivating.

Here are some examples that illustrate just one step in the process of taking an ordinary woman and removing real or perceived flaws to make the picture more captivating. These are portions of screen-shots of photos before and after touch-up.

You can also watch a film from the Dove Self Esteem Fund called How did our idea of beauty become so distorted?

The cover-up goes beyond the visual and physical. A sexy picture you see in a magazine may be so attractive to you in part because it shows all of the glamor and beauty of an "ideal" woman, but none of the inconveniences of a real one. In your imagination, the woman in the picture is flawless – all pros and no cons – while you are all too familiar with the little annoying habits of a real woman. In reality, the woman behind the picture is probably rather earthly and quite similar to your own female neighbors and relatives, with habits and needs that would quickly drain the glamor from your perception of her, if you were to spend some time with her in the real world.

Can Porn Make Your Wife Unattractive?

Research shows that men in relationships who spend time looking at other attractive women tend to become less satisfied with their partners over time ("Attending to Temptation: The Operation (and Perils) of Attention to Alternatives in Close Relationships" Presentation at 10th Sydney Symposium of Social Psychology:Social Relationships: Cognitive, Affective and Motivational Processes, by Rowland S. Miller). Although this loss of satisfaction may be due to various factors, there are at least four ways that looking at sexy pictures of other women can make your wife less attractive to you. First, the pictures can leave you less satisfied with your wife's beauty because of the "contrast effect." Second they can distort your tastes in feminine beauty by perceived associations of sexiness. Third, they can dull your ability to feel sensual pleasure. Fourth, they can decrease your wife's desire to make herself beautiful for you. There are scientific studies that support some of these ideas, though solid research on others seems to be lacking.

The contrast effect. Have you ever noticed that after you have eaten a piece of candy, an orange tastes sour, and an apple tastes bland? If you hadn't just eaten the candy, both would have been perfectly enjoyable. The way we perceive something depends on what else we have to compare it with. The models and actresses who appear in sexy pictures tend to be unnaturally attractive because they are selected from a pool of highly attractive women and made to look even more attractive with makeup, surgery, soft lighting, flattering poses, photo touch-up etc. Their attractiveness may also be enhanced because of the seductive way they dress or behave. Because these women appear unusually attractive (even in a non-sexual way), the viewer becomes subject to a contrast effect. This means that, after viewing such artificially enhanced beauties, a man will perceive the real women in his life to be relatively unattractive. Research has shown this effect to be real. For example, in a study called "Influence of popular erotica on judgments of strangers and mates" (Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 25: 159-167 [1989]) in which men rated the attractiveness of average-looking women (in photographs), those women were rated significantly lower for attractiveness by men who had previously looked at pictures of unclothed women from a popular magazine, than by men who had not. In a similar study called "Contrast effects and judgments of physical attractiveness: When beauty becomes a social problem" (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 38:131-140 [1980]) women rated for attractiveness received lower ratings from men who had just watched Charlie's Angels than from men who had watched a different television show.

On a practical level, the results of these experiments suggest that the less time you spend looking at women (in photos, film, paintings, or life) who are made to look unnaturally attractive, the more attractive your wife will appear to you. Your wife is a real flesh-and-blood woman. She is uniquely beautiful, but her particular beauty will be less apparent to you if you are subconsciously contrasting her with artificially enhanced images of other women. Your wife is like a naturally delicious fruit. She has natural beauty that could be perfectly enjoyable if not for the sensory dulling effects of eye candy.

Competing sexual associations. Sexy images of women are frequently used in product advertisements. For example, many beer commercials exhibit scantily clad flirting women. The advertisers hope that the particular brand of beer will be perceived as "sexy" and desirable by its association with such images.

Just as sexy pictures can influence how you feel about different brands of beer, they can also influence how you feel about different features or behaviors of women. Just as a brand of beer can come to seem sexy to you because of its association with sexual images, female features or behaviors depicted in the same advertisement may also begin to seem sexy. For example, suppose you see a beer commercial in which an overtly sexy woman with green eyes and braided hair, wearing a lacy white top and sitting on a buckskin horse, blows a kiss at a man holding a can of Brand X beer. The advertiser hopes that Brand X beer will now seem sexy to you by association with this sexual image. What may actually happen, however, is that lacy white tops, braided hair, blown kisses, or even buckskin horses may suddenly seem more desirable to you. You may wish your wife had green eyes, or that she would wear such clothing, blow kisses at you or get into riding horses, etc. Since she does not, you feel frustrated with her.

Dulled sensitivity to sexual stimuli. Erotic images can decrease your ability to feel sexual pleasure while simultaneously increasing your desire for it. This causes a process called "escalation" in which you search out images or situations that are even more arousing in an attempt to "feel something . . . anything." You may require increasingly novel or even violent situations to feel any excitement, given your increasingly dulled sexual senses. Even relatively mild images such as pictures of sexy models in clothing or beer advertisements can affect you this way. For example, after enjoying pictures of starlets in party dress in a popular entertainment magazine, you may head home feeling strong desires for sexual excitement. Upon arriving home, however, you find that your wife's appearance and behavior seem boring due to your dulled senses. Still desirous, but frustrated, you are tempted to look elsewhere for excitement.

This process of sensual dulling and escalation is destructive when erotic images of other women are involved, but it has a natural and beneficial counterpart within properly functioning marriage. For example, coming home to find your wife dressed seductively and smiling is like looking at a sexy picture. You enjoy the view for a few minutes, but then the novelty and excitement of it begins to fade. You revive the feeling by stealing a kiss, and then another. She responds in kind. The kissing satisfies for a few more minutes, but then you need something a little stronger to keep the thrill going. This is what brings a man and woman together with enough force to propagate the human species. Without the process of sensual dulling and escalation, you might be satisfied with just looking at her all evening. On the other hand, when the thrill of looking at a sexy picture in a magazine begins to fade, there is nothing more that picture can give you to keep the feeling going, so you look for other, more arousing, pictures to meet your need. When the most arousing picture leaves you unsatisfied, you are left with cravings for more, but no good options.

A discouraged wife. Your wife probably knows that she could never compete with the pornography that is available to you. If you look at it, she can likely sense at some level that she is appearing less attractive to you as a result. If you are finding her less exciting, you are probably not being as affectionate with her as you would have otherwise. All of this can be quite discouraging to her, and she may not see value in putting so much effort into making herself attractive for you, if you are not going to appreciate it.

The following is a simple story to illustrate how these principles might play out in a marriage.

You and your friend are walking down a street when you both see a glossy magazine that someone has discarded. Your friend picks it up and flips through it, drinking in the pictures of scantily dressed women. You, meanwhile, hang back and avoid looking because you know the long-term effects the pictures can have. Now fast-forward a few years. You have now both married equally attractive women. Your friend still has the habit of enjoying whatever sexually exciting material he comes upon, while you do your best to avoid it. You are at home, just finishing a pleasant meal with your wife as you gaze lovingly at her. She has never looked better to you than she does now at 45. The way you treat her and look at her makes her feel cared for and attractive, so she takes good care of herself and of you. You are looking forward to spending the rest of the evening with her. Your friend and his wife are at their home, having just eaten some leftover pizza while watching television. They glance at each other only when necessary, and speak in guarded tones. She feels unattractive and unloved, so she is emotionally distant and doesn't put much effort into making herself look attractive for him. Being with her depresses him, so he is leaving to play cards with some friends. She plans to find pleasure and comfort with a bowl of ice cream and a romance novel.

Can Porn Make Marital Sex Boring?

Is porn sexy?

In a classic study called "Pornography’s impact on sexual satisfaction" (Journal of Applied Social Psychology 18:438–453 [1988]), participants who were subjected to common pornography became less satisfied with the affection, physical appearance, sexual curiosity, and sexual performance of their intimate partners. Additional studies, including one called "Effect of cybersex addiction on the family" (Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity 7:31–58 [2000]), one called "The new 'elephant in the living room': Effects of compulsive cybersex behaviors on the spouse" (CyberPsychology & Behavior 1:178 [1988]), and one called "The significance of heavy pornography involvement for romantic partners: research and clinical implications" (Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy 28:193–206 [2002]), have also supported a tendency of decreased sexual satisfaction in the viewer of pornography and/or his or her intimate partner. I suspect that the principles involved here are some of the same ones discussed in Can Porn Make Your Wife Unattractive?

Your enjoyment of the sexual affection that your wife gives you depends not only on her actions, but even more on your sexual expectations and preferences, and on the competing thoughts and memories that may come into your mind during lovemaking. Pornography can influence each of these things.

In fact, it seems that pornography not only puts a damper on one's marital sex life, but also makes sex in general less exciting. As evidence of this, consider that typical commercial pornography, in order to sell, has to be spiked with some rather bizarre additives. It can't just be a normal attractive couple having sex. These additives commonly include activities that, in real life, would be impossible, painful or very uncomfortable (and not particularly sexual or exciting to those who have not acquired a taste for them); bodies with rather distorted proportions; and piercings in rather inconvenient places. The reason the pornographer has to include these artificial additives is that his customers are no longer interested in real, natural sex due to the unnatural effects of pornography on their tastes and preferences. These customers are no longer able to fully enjoy a real sexual relationship, so they are forced to retreat further into a world of fantasy in order to feel the thrill they crave.

Rather than being sexy, pornography is more likely to inhibit a man's ability to enjoy a real sexual relationship. He becomes sexually frustrated because he is conditioned by the porn to crave certain situations, but is unable to find or reproduce them in his real life relationships. Sexual situations that would be exciting to people who don't use porn become boring to the porn user. When a man uses pornography, he becomes, in a way, less of a sexual being.

You can find more research on the effects of pornography on marriage reviewed in "The impact of internet pornography on marriage and the family: a review of the research" (Sexual Addiction & Compulsivity 13:131-165 [2006]).