The problem starts at 13.
That’s the average age that boys are exposed to porn, according to multiple studies.British Board of Film Classification. (2020). Young people, pornography & age-verification. BBFC. Retrieved from https://www.bbfc.co.uk/about-classification/research; https://www.jmir.org/2023/1/e43116/PDFCopy And that’s not even the worst part. Some studies suggest that pornography exposure in boys can happen as early as 5.https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2017/08/pornography-exposureCopy
At five, boys should be learning to read, developing their imagination, and building early friendships, not being exposed to pornography. But in our era of smartphones and unlimited internet, pornography access has largely become a quick internet search and click away. And restrictions on computers can be easily overridden.
A recent article by Mamamia addressed the difficulties of raising boys when pornography is so easily accessible and difficult to censor. Mamamia covered how common it was for young boys to watch porn. They found that out of “830 young Australians aged 16 to 20, half of young men watch porn at least once a week and nearly 20 percent almost daily.”https://www.mamamia.com.au/how-porn-is-affecting-young-boys/Copy
The problem is both the type and the amount of porn that boys are watching has changed.
Porn has changed
Back in 1953, Hugh Hefner released his first Playboy. Still, images of naked models opened the doors for modern-day pornography. Just three years later, VCR emerged, and in the 80s, video pornography became available in the United States for the first time. Still, you must show your ID to prove you’re 18, but it’s becoming more accessible. Nothing, however, compares to how accessible it became once the internet started in the 1990s. Suddenly, anyone can access just about any type of porn they want with just a quick search.
Now porn sites consistently remain some of the top most used websites in the world. As of May 2024, Pornhub was the leading adult content and pornographic website for global users. It averaged about 5.49 billion monthly visits. Xvideos ranked next with about 4.02 billion monthly visits.https://www.statista.com/statistics/1445661/most-visited-porn-websites-worldwide/ Copy
That’s an average of 92 billion visits for 2024. That’s 252 million visits a day. 175 thousand visits every minute. So if it took you six minutes to read this article, Pornhub and Xvideos would have already received over a million visits.
Porn started out as just still images, but now it’s grown to be something much bigger than that.
Porn enables violence and aggression towards women
Not only did how accessible, affordable, and anonymous porn became change, but the type of porn that people were producing changed too. A concerned mom in Mamamia addressed the growing disparity between what started out as still images but has grown to something much worse. “The online environment and the porn and depiction of violence against women in particular is something most adults didn’t grow up with themselves.”
Unfortunately, studies only confirm this mom’s worry. Research suggests that 1 in 3 pornographic videos contain some sort of violence against women. In a 2010 study on the “best-selling” pornography videos, a study found that “the 304 scenes analyzed 88.2% contained physical aggression, principally spanking, gagging, and slapping, while 48.7% of scenes contained verbal aggression, primarily name-calling. Perpetrators of aggression were usually male, whereas targets of aggression were overwhelmingly female.”https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/epdf/10.1177/1077801210382866Copy
A recent NSW health report showed exposure to violent porn was one of the four common factors behind harmful adolescent behaviors.
A study from 2021 suggests that porn encourages aggressive behavior in men toward women. The study surveyed 320 men and found that the objectification and aggression that often happens in porn leads men to be associated with “aggressive attitudes” and “aggressive behaviors.”Zhou, Y., Liu, T., Yan, Y., & Paul, B. (2021). Pornography use, two forms of dehumanization, and sexual aggression: Attitudes vs. behaviors. Null, 1-20.Copy
A study from 2016 found that pornography consumption was associated with a likelihood of “sexual aggression among adults and adolescents.”Journal of Communication, Volume 66, Issue 1, February 2016, Pages 183–205, https://doi.org/10.1111/jcom.12201Copy The study also found that there was no significant research to support the idea that men with tendencies for sexually aggressive behavior were only watching pornography to support their “already established sexual scripts” (199). Instead, it found that “pornography consumption predicted boys’ later sexual aggression” (199).
That means porn has an impact on whether boys will develop these behaviors. Porn establishes aggression and objectification, possibly developing these behaviors in boys who may not have had them initially.
Porn changes boys brains
The problem isn’t just that boys are being exposed to porn at a young age or that porn has changed. It’s that a combination of these two things has an actual impact on a young boy’s brain.
Although not formally diagnosed as an addiction, porn induces dopamine in a way that mimics addiction. JAMA Psychiatry found that, like with alcohol or cocaine addicts, there is a smaller grey matter volume. They concluded that neural changes in the “brains of pornography users…mirrors the use of addictive drugs.”https://acpeds.org/position-statements/the-impact-of-pornography-on-children#_edn13Copy
The fact that porn is so violent, easy to access, and anonymous makes it dangerous for young boys to see. And unlike alcohol, cocaine, or other addictive substances, there’s hardly anything standing between young boys and getting access to it.
Luckily, we have some tips on how to fight it.
What you can do
Mamamia pointed out that often, “parents aren’t aware their child is watching porn or the nature of the porn they’re watching, so education is the first step.” One mom discussed how she was already having educating conversations with her seven-year-old boy. “We break it down and talk to him about boundaries… and if he feels scared or uncomfortable, there are only two things he needs to do: turn away and tell a safe person.”
Like Mamamia, we agree that education is so important in the fight against pornography. That’s why we’ve compiled different resources to make educating your kids, friends, or even yourself easy and accessible.
Some of our resources include our age-appropriate and engaging presentation series about the harms of porn and what you can do, our Brain, Heart, World documentary, hundreds of Youtube videos, and of course, this blog.
You’re not alone. We believe in you, so keep fighting!
