To Watch or Not to Watch: Exploring the Complex Relationship between Women and Pornography

• In Event: 240 - Section on Consumers and Consumption Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Paper Session: Table 04. Gendered Scripts and Rituals of Consumption

Abstract

A decline in funding for evidence based sex education programs and a rise in the availability,
accessibility, and affordability of commercial pornography mean young women’s sexual scripts
are increasingly being formulated by pornographic media, with little sexual education to
counteract such scripts. Cognitive script theory argues media scripts create a readily accessible
heuristic model for decision-making; the more users watch a particular media script, the more
embedded those codes of behavior become and the more likely they are to use those scripts to act
in real life. Our previous research on men found pornography to play a significant role in their
real life sexual encounters. However, for women, the pornographic script, often steeped in
violence and female degradation, presents dissonant images of sexual pleasure and violence.
Given these dissonant scripts, does pornography inform women’s sexuality and dyadic sexual
encounters in a pattern similar to that of men? To answer this question, we surveyed 877 college
women (ages 18-29 years) in the United States, associating consumption of pornography with
sexual preferences and concerns. Results indicated while a majority of women have seen
pornography (87%), most (52%) chose not to consume it. Among those who did, rates of
consumption were associated with greater likelihood of using pornography during sex, engaging
in sexual acts depicted in pornography, deliberately conjuring images of pornography during sex to maintain arousal, and having increased concerns over sexual performance and body image.

Author

• Jennifer A. Johnson, Virginia Commonwealth University