The influence of sexually explicit material on everyday sexual behavior

Abstract

In the media, interaction of sexual content is common nowadays. It is well known that what is depicted in the papers, magazines, songs, the Internet and television, influences believes, values and even behavior of the people exposed. A new term used for the extensive amount of sex in the media is sexualization. A discussion concerning the negative influence of sexual elements in the media is in progress in The Netherlands. Before deciding on advisable decisions, more information is needed about the effects from sex in the media. However, little is known about the influence of sexualization on everyday sexual behavior. The purpose of this research was to investigate this influence using three videos. The experimental condition holds watching a video containing sexual explicit material, the control condition holds watching a video about animals and a condition with no video. Using the following variables motivation for sex, satisfaction about sexlife, frequency of sex and emotional en physical health. In this study the outcomes were controlled for the variables age, gender, attitudes towards erotica, sex dating and relationships, total amount of exposure to erotic material and relationship. Results demonstrate no association between sexual explicit material and everyday sexual behavior. Furthermore, we found a significant effect from attitudes towards erotica, sex, relationships and dating on motivation towards sex. Also a significant effect was found between attitudes towards erotica on health perception. At last, further research need to be done, paying keen attention to an equal variance of the sample and control of confounding variables; level of arousal, attachment style, social environment, number of sexual partners and implicit cognitions.