Associations Between Pornography Use and Sexual Dynamics Among Heterosexual Couples

Pornography Use and Holistic Sexual Functioning: a Systematic Review of Recent Research

“…Similarly, women seem less likely to report problematic pornography use and more likely to report higher sexual satisfaction associated with their pornography use than men [33]. Additional findings showed that, in heterosexual relationships, the female partner's use of pornography was associated with higher sexual desire [38,39] greater sexual satisfaction [30,40], and more frequent engagement in sexual encounters with their partner [29,30]. In addition, for both men and women, some studies have found that watching pornography with a partner was associated with higher sexual satisfaction [28,33].…”

“…In a sample of same and mixed-sex couples, solitary use of pornography on days of sexual intimacy with their partner was associated with higher sexual distress for their partner [30]. Among heterosexual relationships, pornography use by the male partner was related to lower sexual desire and sexual satisfaction for the female partner [38,39]. Greater pornography use discrepancies between partners was also associated with lower sexual desire for the female partner [47].…”

“…Regarding men specifically, pornography use was associated with lower levels of their own sexual satisfaction [26,38,45,49], especially when they reported problematic pornography use [33,50] or used pornography to avoid negative emotions [29••]. Frequency of masturbation was indirectly related to men's sexual satisfaction, whereby more frequent masturbation was related to having a preference for porn-like sex, which was negatively associated with sexual satisfaction [43].…”

Web-Based Relationship Education and Pornography-Related Behaviors: A Single-Group Design During the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…Meta-analyses have indicated an overall small negative effect between pornography consumption and sexual satisfaction ( r = − .11; Wright et al, 2017 ), but these effects may be dependent on gender and joint couple use. Specifically, greater pornography use has been shown to be associated with lower sexual satisfaction among males; however, greater pornography use has been shown to be associated with greater sexual satisfaction among females (Bridges, 2007 ; Willoughby et al, 2021 ). Furthermore, more joint pornography use has been associated with an increased sexual desire, greater sex quality, and more intimacy with partners (Rodrigues & Martins, 2021 ).…”