Study Finds Porn Exposure Associated With Smaller Brain Region 211
New submitter Bodhammer (559311) writes "German researchers looked at the brains of 64 men between the ages of 21 and 45 and found that one brain region (the striatum, linked to reward processing), was smaller in the brains of porn watchers, and that a specific part of the same region is also less activated when exposed to more pornography." While it's tempting to cast blame, "the study doesn't confirm whether watching porn causes the changes, or whether people with a certain brain type are inherently more apt to tune into X-rated content." The study's abstract is available; the paper itself is pay-walled.
Re:Presumably this is relative to porn abstainers (Score:5, Informative)
I watched a TED talk about the effect of pornography on the male brain and the presenter described how difficult it was for him to find control subjects for his study.
Well (Score:3, Informative)
Once you jack off to Japanese girls puking in each other's mouths, you can't exactly go back to Playboy.
Re:Presumably this is relative to porn abstainers (Score:5, Informative)
i think my record is 3 years no porn and of course no masturbation. but then again i am not typical and haven't even had sex, despite being 36 years old.
Correct. You are not typical. Your experience may be very normal in a community you would identify with such as asexuality [asexuality.org], or it could potentially be associated with a disorder, such as hyposexuality [wikipedia.org].
Your situation may be entirely healthy and rewarding for you, and that's great. And, frankly, you have probably saved a lot of money, time and heartache compared to many of us on the other side of that spectrum! I would just caution you not to use it as a yardstick for most other people in judging questions of sexuality.
Re:Do you give up higher cerebral function (Score:5, Informative)
Now that I've had a chance to sit down and read through both the study and a few other things... you're correct, but it's not completely clear-cut, at least in my opinion, that the changes under consideration actually relate to reward-seeking, addict-like behaviour and aren't simply, say, a lack of sexual development due to being single.
They found a variety of different features in their test subjects (actual anatomical differences, differences in activity level within the caudate, differences in interconnectedness between pudamen and caudate...) and saw these were strongly correlated with level of pornography use, on the basis of addiction. However, there were some people in the study who used alcohol in a mildly problematic way. They showed only a r = ~0.25 (weak positive correlation) with porn usage. That strikes me as pretty inconsistent—if these are pathways strongly implicated in addictive behaviour, why didn't the drunks line up more neatly with their data? They don't mention alcoholism again in the discussion, except to draw parallels between porn usage and various forms of drug usage, and to suggest psychiatrists should ask about porn usage.
Re: Presumably this is relative to porn abstainers (Score:1, Informative)
Dude, get a box of condoms and try a hooker.
Condoms have limited efficacy against herpes and HPV, both of which you'll get to enjoy for the rest of your life if you manage to catch them. To each their own, but I'd reconsider the hooker suggestion and just stick with the porn, there's no orgasm worth a lifetime affliction....
Re:Do you give up higher cerebral function (Score:2, Informative)
other things would be better, alcohol metabolism (Score:5, Informative)
Alcoholism would be among the least useful compulsive behaviors to compare because a large percentage of alcoholics metabolize alcohol differently than non-alcoholics. Therefore a significant portion of the problem is purely physical, not behavioral or centered in the brain. Potheads might be a better comparison - as far as we know, everyone's body processes THC in essentially the same way. There are of course many other compulsive behaviors that seem to be purely psychological / behavioral / brain-based, as opposed to being caused in part by differences in other bodily systems.
Specifically, we know that the difference in alcohol processing is not a RESULT of drinking because non-drinkers who were siblings of alcoholics often displayed the same trait. It appears likely that these siblings were genetically predisposed to become alcoholics, but had not activated the condition by introducing alcohol into their system. The metabolic difference happens after alcohol turns into acetaldehyde. Most people have TWO enzymes that quickly break down the acetaldehyde. Many alcoholics are missing one of the two enzymes, which is controlled by a certain gene that has been mapped. With one of the enzymes missing, the acetaldehyde remains for a much longer period of time. During the period that acetaldehyde is present in significant amounts, the alcoholic experiences the phenomenon of craving - an overpowering desire for more alcohol. Therefore, it seems that alcoholism is largely caused by the lack of an important enzyme, rather than a difference in brain function.
Of course, if a person who is missing the enzyme never becomes intoxicated in the first place, the craving will not be triggered. Also, there are many people who drink excessively but do not lack the enzyme and therefore probably do not have the craving effect. There are of course behavioral and psychological factors involved for these people, who could be called "hard drinkers".
Re:Do you give up higher cerebral function (Score:4, Informative)
Just for your convenience, then, here are all the statistics from the paper:
And just because it's so important to the science, the rest of the results:
As for alternative hypotheses, the only one they present is "Individuals with lower striatum volume may need more external stimulation to experience pleasure and might therefore experience pornography consumption as more rewarding, which may in turn lead to higher PHs."