[On pornography and sexual education: Can "sex" legitimate humiliation and violence?]

Pornography, sexual orientation and ambivalent sexism in young adults in Spain

BACKGROUND

On line platforms offer access to an almost unlimited variety of pornographic material that shows high levels of sexism. Despite this fact, there are still few studies that assess the effect of pornography on sexism in young adults The aim of this study is to analyze the association of pornography consumption and sexual orientation with benevolent sexism (BS) and hostile sexism (HS) in young men and women.

METHODS

We surveyed 2,346 people aged 18-35 years old. Multiple regression models were carried out for BS and HS. The independent variables: current pornography consumption and sexual orientation. Covariates: socio-demographic variables -age, sex, level of education and place of birth-.

RESULTS

A) HS: Men who consumed pornography had higher median values of HS than those who did not [β(95%CI):2.39(0.67;4.10)]. Homosexual/ bisexual men displayed lower values of HS than heterosexual men [β(95%CI):-2.98(-4.52;-1.45)]. The increase in HS levels associated with pornography consumption was notably greater in homosexual and bisexual women relative to heterosexual women, where that pattern was not observed [β(95%CI for interaction): 2.27(0.11; 4.43)]. B) BS: Mean values of BS were observed to be lower for both women [β(95%CI):-2.16(-2.99;-1.32)] and men [β(95%CI):-4.30(-5.75;-2.86)] who consumed pornography compared to those who did not. Homosexual/bisexual men recorded mean values of BS lower than heterosexual men [β(95%CI):-3.10(-4.21;-1.99)].

CONCLUSIONS

Pornography consumption is related to sexism and differs according to sex and sexual orientation. As sexism is the substratum of inequality between men and women, it is urgent to launch affective-sexual education programs for young people that take into account the determinants of sexism.

¿Pornografía al alcance de un clic? Una revisión de la literatura reciente sobre adolescentes españoles

Las tecnologías de la información y la comunicación (TICs) proporcionan un acceso constante e inmediato a una amplia gama de información y recursos. Los/as adolescentes, habitualmente considerados/as nativos/as digitales, utilizan los medios tecnológicos y los espacios virtuales para explorar su dimensión sexuada accediendo a contenidos pornográficos. La revisión bibliográfica que se presenta en este trabajo tiene un doble objetivo: evaluar el consumo de pornografía entre los adolescentes españoles y analizar las variables asociadas desde una perspectiva de género El estudio consiste en una revisión sistemática de trabajos sobre adolescentes españoles publicados entre 2016 y 2020. Los resultados muestran que acceden a contenidos pornográficos por primera vez alrededor de los 12 años, y que el consumo de pornografía se consolida durante la adolescencia, especialmente en el caso de los varones, que son los principales consumidores. También muestran que la pornografía es una fuente de información para muchos adolescentes que no reciben suficiente educación sexual ni en casa ni en la escuela. El consumo de pornografía durante la adolescencia está asociado a una serie de consecuencias, como el sexismo, la violencia y el consumo de sustancias, y puede conducir a una visión distorsionada de la sexualidad. La situación que revelan estos resultados pone de manifiesto la necesidad de apoyar la educación sexual en la familia y en la escuela para dotar a los jóvenes de las herramientas necesarias para disfrutar de su sexualidad de forma plena y responsable.

Analyzing University Students' Perceptions Regarding Mainstream Pornography and Its Link to SDG5

BACKGROUND

Violence against women and girls continues to be a widespread problem, and its elimination is one of the targets of the Sustainable Development Goal 5 toward achieving gender equality. One of the main causes of this violence is the structural sexism present in societies that continues to be perpetuated through pornography, especially among young people. Therefore, the main objective of this research is to analyze the consumption of pornography among young people, studying its effects and relationship with affective-sexual education.

METHODS

This study was carried out with a sample of 280 students in the north of Spain. The ages of the entire sample ranged from 18 to 37 years (M = 20.3, SD = 2.6). From the sample, 78.9% (n = 221) define their gender identity as women and 21.1% (n = 59) define their gender identity as men; no person within this research self-identify as non-binary. The instrument used was the Survey on Affective-sexual Education and Pornography (Ballester et al., 2019). The sample was recruited by snowball sampling.

RESULTS

The results of the present study show that the average age at which people start watching pornography is 10.4 years. The majority of young people consume it to satisfy their curiosity. In addition, with regard to gender, boys consume more pornography, especially for masturbation. Finally, 20.5% of the participants believe that the sexual education they have received has not been adequate, and most of them solve their sexual doubts by asking friends.

CONCLUSIONS

The results indicate that it is necessary to improve the affective-sexual education provided in schools, since students consume pornography at a very early age, and young people have normalized its consumption to address their curiosity and satisfy their sexual needs. Finally, the impact of pornography consumption on SDG5 was reflected on.