“Are You Ashamed to Talk About It?” Pornography, Moral Incongruence, Morality, Ethics, and Religious Distress in Romania

Abstract

This research aimed to explore factors implicated in pornography consumption. The study involved 237 individuals, out of whom 56 were male (23.6%) and 181 were female (76.4%). All participants had voluntarily viewed pornographic material at least once in the last 6 months. Their ages ranged from 18 to 76 years (M = 22.83; SD = 8.09). Respondents completed surveys related to the frequency of pornography use, moral disapproval of pornography, moral incongruence, and religious distress. The results indicated significant associations between our main variables. Additionally, this paper highlights important gender differences existing in the Romanian population regarding the frequency of pornography use and discusses the relevant ethical implications of pornography in the online environment.The present work contributes by enhancing knowledge about the relationships of the variables mentioned above in the shape of theoretical model "Pornography Problems Due to Moral Incongruence" on a population predominantly of Orthodox Christian faith. In addition, from a practical perspective, our results can serve as a starting point reference for mental health workers (e.g., clinical psychologists and psychotherapists) in Romania when developing diverse approaches to address the cases of pornography consumption they encounter within their practices.

Socio-Demographic and Economic Factors Involved in the Consumption of Sexual Explicit Material. Ethical Aspects, Moral Incongruence, and the Frequency of Pornography Use

“…Participants rated their responses on a 7-point Likert scale, with 1 = "only once in the last 6 months" and 7 = "daily or almost daily". This approach has been previously employed in studies involving the Romanian population (Huțul & Karner-Huțuleac, 2023). The responses were subjected to averaging, where higher scores reflected greater frequency of pornography use.…”

“…To assess this variable, we used one question (e.g., "Often I felt strong discomfort because of the fact that my sexual fantasies, thoughts and behaviors were inconsistent with my moral and/or religious beliefs.") that had been utilized in previous studies (Huțul & Karner-Huțuleac, 2023;Lewczuk et al, 2020). The item was rated on a 3point Likert scale, with 0 = "This statement was never true for me.…”

“…All of this situation adds to the existing ethical concerns that scholarly literature already addresses (Mestre-Bach et al, 2021), such as the fact that online environments host images, including those depicting child sexual abuse or sexual violence (Lee et al, 2020;McGlynn et al, 2021), and that anyone can upload explicit sexual content, which can be used for purposes like "Porn Revenge" (DeKeseredy, 2021;Huțul & Karner-Huțuleac, 2022;Uhl et al, 2018). Furthermore, the recent discussion proposed regarding the ethical aspects related to pornography is linked to the associated incomes and the taxes that the Romanian state loses (Huțul & Karner-Huțuleac, 2023). It is well-known that in Romania, 13% of undeclared activities are conducted on digital labor platforms (Mațcu et al, 2023), and a significant portion of the pornography industry operates in the online domain, as mentioned in many public cases (Playtech.ro, 2020;Redacția Observatorul, 2021).…”

“…Pornography, also referred to in academic literature as sexually explicit material (Arrington-Sanders et al, 2015;Karner-Huțuleac & Huțul, 2023;Peter & Valkenburg, 2006) or content (Kraus & Russell, 2008), is generally understood as any textual, visual, or video material created to elicit sexual arousal in its audience or users (Willoughby & Dover, 2023). The consumption of explicit sexual content has notably increased in the last years (Willoughby et al, 2021), since the moment when pornography became highly accessible from any household with internet access (Cooper, 1998;Young, 2008).…”