May 26, 2021 – – Get moving, Netflix. You’re not the only video streaming outfit to benefit from the COVID-19 lockdown.
New evidence shows that American pornography use increased dramatically in the early months of the pandemic as stay-at-home orders restricted other types of … outlets.
However, the study, which was based on a nationwide survey and XXX website traffic reports, also found that porn use had dropped to pre-pandemic levels by October. This also applied to those who initially reported a sharp increase in their erotic viewing habits.
In addition, researchers said they found no evidence that being “porn demic” resulted in significant increases in problem behaviors such as addictive, compulsive, risky, or unhealthy activities. Nor did they uncover any evidence that depression or anxiety was rising in avid porn users.
“The results didn’t really surprise us,” says lead researcher Joshua Grubbs, PhD, assistant professor of psychology at Bowling Green State University in Ohio.
Even among people who believed their porn use increased during the pandemic, it was back to normal by August 2020. pic.twitter.com/HHG7PObF7E
– Josh Grubbs (@JoshuaGrubbsPhD) May 19, 2021
“Yes, people might have watched a bit of extra porn at the beginning of the pandemic, and then they went back to their normal state. That is exactly what I would have expected. “
In the first few months of the pandemic, some mental health experts warned that porn use would skyrocket, and they said it could lead to a surge in mental and mental health problems already exacerbated by the coronavirus crisis .
However, the new study found no evidence that these terrible predictions were on target.
“There’s no evidence that people developed massive porn problems or that porn addiction became a problem for more people,” says Grubbs, a sexologist and addiction specialist. “It just looks like people at home are bored, they probably watched porn first and then decided, ‘All right, I’ve done enough of it, so now it’s time to bake some sourdough bread.'”
Justin Lehmiller, PhD, a sex researcher at the Kinsey Institute who was not involved in the study, says the results reflect his own work in the field: “In early March last year, the media had all these predictions that porn was use and Masturbation would soar, ”says Lehmiller, who moderates a podcast on“ Sex and Psychology ”. “But the data we gathered really challenged that. We also found that overall people were less active, masturbating less, and having less partner sex for all sorts of reasons, “unrelated to porn use.
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