Sex Aware

Are Pornography and Marriage Substitutes for Young Men? by Michael Malcolm, George S Naufal (November 2014) forthcoming in: Eastern Economic Journal, 2015

Substitutes for marital sexual gratification may impact the decision to marry. Proliferation of the Internet has made pornography an increasingly low-cost substitute. We investigate the effect of Internet usage, and of pornography consumption specifically, on the marital status of young men. We show that increased Internet usage is negatively associated with marriage formation. Pornography consumption specifically has an even stronger effect. Instrumental variables and a number of robustness checks suggest that the effect is causal.

Research published in the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Germany claims that the rise of free porn on the internet is both correlated with the decline in the amount of young adult men who are married and might actually play a role in the decline. Researchers surveyed more than 1500 men between 18 and 35, analyzing how they used the internet between 2000 and 2004. The researchers took a look at how many hours each participant spent and how many looked at porn versus religious sites, adjusting for variables like age, income, education, religiosity, and employment. Roberto A. Ferman at Washington Post writes :

Broadly, higher Internet usage was associated with lower marriage rates. But pornography use in particular was more closely linked to those participants who were not married than any other form of Internet use, including regular use of financial websites, news websites, sports websites, and several others. The opposite, for comparison, was true for religious website use, which was positively correlated with marriage.

One of the study's authors, professor at University of West Chester, Pennsylvania Dr. Michael Malcolm explains that the study could point to marriage and sexual gratification. Ferman continues:

If pornography is viewed as a means of alternative sexual gratification, then it could be undercutting the need for marriages to serve this function, at the very least during a younger age. Think of it as a milder form of premarital sex.

A British firm has launched what it claims to be the sexiest sleep-aid ever - a sex dream machine!

Little Rooster, the creators of the alarm clock panty vibrator say they have invented a sex dream machine. Dream Rooster works by vibrating in the underwear while the user sleeps. Says inventor Tony Maggs:

I realised a sex dream machine was possible when my customers told me that Little Rooster, the world's first alarm clock that wakes you by vibrating in your underwear, was giving them erotic dreams. Little Rooster stimulates you for about two minutes before waking you up. Dream Rooster can stimulate you for several hours!

Women simply slip Dream Rooster into their underwear before going to bed. The vibrating leg rests against the clitoris and between the labial lips and the wide, flat body stabilises Dream Rooster by resting inside the underwear, against the user's front.

Men insert their penis and testicles through the ring. The ring both helps hold Dream Rooster in place and also transmits stimulation. Dream Rooster is held against the user's front by their underwear.

With porn becoming more acceptable, a new large survey reveals that half of the adult population of Denmark watches porn, with most preferring the free stuff.

Three quarters of Danish men and a third of Danish women watch porn, according to a new survey carried out on behalf of the women's magazine Q .

Eight out of ten users said that they only view porn on free sites and 84% said they primarily watch porn alone. One in four respondents said that they see it with their partner.

Helle Hartz, the editor of women's magazine Tidens Kvinder , told Q that with one third of Danish women watching porn, there has been a change in attitudes toward explicit material.

I think there has been in increase in the number of women who watch porn because there are now so many more woman- or pair-friendly films that appeal to them. It's become more acceptable to see porn because they are now produced in much better quality and with a focus on women so it's no longer so 'sleazy' to watch.

A giant inflatable butt plug has been destroyed by vandals in Paris.

The 80 foot art work was installed at  Place Vendome and was claimed to be a 'tree' by the artist Paul McCarthy. Past artwork by McCarthy seems to suggest that he has a somewhat erotic sense of humour and a tree is an an unlikely explanation.

Tragedy struck late on Friday night when the ambiguous structure was attacked and deflated.

A police spokesman said:

Individuals have severed the cables that hold the sculpture in place, taking advantage of a momentary lack of a security guard.

Farnce's Minister of Culture, Fleur Pellerin, called the vandalism a n attack on creative freedom as well as a physical attack on the artist himself.

People in the UK are having less sex than they were back in 2008, according to a new survey of British sexual behaviour carried out by The Observer . But if we're not doing it, we're still watching and reading it.

More than half (56%) of Britons watch online pornography at least occasionally and 15% do so on a regular basis. However, there is a disparity between the sexes, with 76% of men watching pornography on the internet, compared with just 36% of women.

The tables are turned when it comes to reading erotica, including the likes of best-selling trilogy Fifty Shades of Grey . While 53% of women read erotica at least occasionally, only 32% of men can say the same.

Despite the nation's dwindling sexual activity, the majority (72%) of those who watch online porn said that they do not believe the practice impacts on their expectations of their sex life.

Sex dolls used to be inflatable and made of vinyl or latex and had only a passing resemblance to reality. Most of the more sophisticated dolls we see now are created by artist Matt McMullen, who about a decade ago was experimenting with materials for sculpture. He started working on a lifelike silicone female mannequin and documented the progress on his website He then became inundated with requests if they could be used as sex dolls.

The demand was so strong that he decided to make the dolls anatomically correct and the extremely life-like RealDoll.com was born . Over the years, the company has perfected the dolls to make them look even more realistic; they are custom-produced with a variety of wigs, skin and eye colour, genitalia type and size, and other body proportions. A basic doll retails for $6000 upwards.

The movie Lars and The Real Girl features a RealDoll, with an extensive scene showing the RealDoll.com website. However, Lars didn't order the doll to use as a sex toy. He acts as if she is human, by giving her a name, Bianca, and pretending she is his girlfriend. He introduces her to his family and the people in his small community. Lars is very concerned to keep the relationship between him and Bianca pure, and she sleeps next door with his brother and sister-in-law. The story may sound a bit silly but it's an endearing movie and has a lovely ending.

Apparently RealDolls are quite popular in Australia. Dr Cathleen Maslen from the University of Western Australia has studied the RealDoll subculture and believes that despite the sexual marketing, not all the men who order them perceive their dolls as sexual objects. Some men view them as an alternative to having a relationship and take pleasure in buying them clothes and dressing them up. McMullen believes that for men without a choice, or with social interaction problems, having a doll as a companion or for physical needs is better than having no one.

In Japan, a high-tech industry is constantly looking at ways to make dolls look more real. The dolls have realistic-to-touch skin and authentic-looking eyes, and some have moveable joints. They are sold under the name of Dutch Wives, a reference to hand-sewn leather masturbation puppets made by the 17th -century Dutch sailors who were trading with the Japanese.

Japanese sex dolls are now so life-like that they come with authentic-looking eyes and skin that feels real to touch.

One maker, Orient Industry, will even customise a doll to your exact requirements so you can choose her bust size, hair colour, eyes and everything about her right down to moveable fingers.

The company says its new range of dolls, made of high quality silicone, are so good they are being mistaken for real women and boasts that anyone who buys one will never want a proper girlfriend again.

The dolls are sold under the name Dutch Wives', which is a Japanese term for a sex doll. Priced at a little over £ 1,000 each, sales suggest they are a roaring success.

Company spokesman Osami Seto said:

The two areas we identified as really needing improvement were the skin and the eyes. We feel we have finally got something that is arguably not distinguishable from the real thing.

A new sex toy featuring an in-built camera aims to help women perform health checks and watch for any changes that could indicate an STI or health problem.

The technology, which was created by Svakom, a US-based company, claims to give women a 'multi-sensory' experience, while allowing them to keep a check on their health.

The Gaga, as it is known, aims to provide pleasure with information. The design comes with a USB charger cable for a laptop or smartphone app allowing women to perform personal check-ups. The Gaga can also be controlled by another person using its wireless app.

The new technology aims to help women learn what is normal for them, and look out for any abnormal changes, which could imply a health problem or STI.

The online store Oliver & Eva has unveiled a Suarez nipple clamp in the form of the footballer's head, teeth bared, for 33 euros ($45). According to the website, the pressure of the bite can be adjusted depending on the mood .

Maybe (Suarez) will be proud to spread a bit of pleasure and love, despite his error on the field, store director Tobias Lundqvist said in a statement.

The store was inspired after Suarez chomped down on Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini's shoulder during a June 24 World Cup match.

Interactive Life Forms, makers of Fleshlight brand products, the world's leading male sex toy, has announced the release of its newest innovative accessory, the Fleshlight LaunchPAD.

The Fleshlight LaunchPAD securely holds the popular Apple iPad as well as a Fleshlight or Flight product enabling the user to enjoy the full Fleshlight experience while enjoying content or communicating live with a friend via applications like Facetime or Skype. The unique placement of the Fleshlight product in relationship to the iPad allows the user to fully immerse himself in POV - Point of View - pornographic content.

Brian Shubin, COO of Interactive Life Forms, said:

Annual tablet sales are now surpassing the number of PC sales with an estimated 70 million iPads being sold across the US in 2013 alone. The Fleshlight LaunchPAD is a great addition to the current Fleshlight owner's experience.

Researchers from the Max Planck Institute in Berlin found that a part of the brain which activates when people feel motivated or rewarded is smaller for porn users.

However the researchers don't know whether this is a correlation or causal link. Dr Simone Kuhn said:

It's not clear, for example, whether watching porn leads to brain changes or whether people born with certain brain types watch more porn.

The abstract for the paper is as follows:

Brain Structure and Functional Connectivity Associated With Pornography Consumption

By Simone Kuhn, Jurgen Gallinat

Importance Since pornography appeared on the Internet, the accessibility, affordability, and anonymity of consuming visual sexual stimuli have increased and attracted millions of users. Based on the assumption that pornography consumption bears resemblance with reward-seeking behavior, novelty-seeking behavior, and addictive behavior, we hypothesized alterations of the frontostriatal network in frequent users.

Objective To determine whether frequent pornography consumption is associated with the frontostriatal network.

Design, Setting, and Participants Sixty-four healthy male adults with a broad range of pornography consumption at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin, Germany, reported hours of pornography consumption per week. Pornography consumption was associated with neural structure, task-related activation, and functional resting-state connectivity.

Main Outcomes and Measures Gray matter volume of the brain was measured by voxel-based morphometry and resting state functional connectivity was measured on 3-T magnetic resonance imaging scans.

Results We found a significant negative association between reported pornography hours per week and gray matter volume in the right caudate (P < .001, corrected for multiple comparisons) as well as with functional activity during a sexual cue--reactivity paradigm in the left putamen (P < .001). Functional connectivity of the right caudate to the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex was negatively associated with hours of pornography consumption.

Conclusions and Relevance The negative association of self-reported pornography consumption with the right striatum (caudate) volume, left striatum (putamen) activation during cue reactivity, and lower functional connectivity of the right caudate to the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex could reflect change in neural plasticity as a consequence of an intense stimulation of the reward system, together with a lower top-down modulation of prefrontal cortical areas. Alternatively, it could be a precondition that makes pornography consumption more rewarding.

Californian Charlie Powell claims to have invented a new kind of condom that he is calling the Galactic Cap . Instead of a latex sheath covering the full length of the penis, Powell's condom encases only the tip. That way, semen is trapped without dulling sexual sensation, according to Powell.

Prodded by a competition funded by Bill Gates, who believes more people will wrap it up if condoms are more pleasurable to use, some engineers are turning their attention to building a better condom. After failing to win a funding prize from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Powell is trying to raise money for making his condom through an IndieGogo campaign.

The cap is made up of two parts: a U-shaped polyurethane adhesive film and a reservoir tip that sticks to the adhesive. The film can be worn for hours or even days before sex. The cap is added immediately before sex.

While the cap has yet to receive approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, it is worth noting that this condom-alternative is lacking for the exact reason it seems appealing. Regular condoms cover the length of the penis because many sexually transmitted infections are spread through skin-to-skin contact. These include genital warts, genital herpes, HPV, syphilis and molluscum.

Powell recognizes the possible implications for the adult video industry. He says a couple of folks from that business have even expressed interest in investing:

If you use this you might overcome the problem of using a condom on camera. A lot of people might not like the look of the thing going in and out. It's transparent, on the head, so it doesn't look so gross.

Considering how important they are to modern society and how little people like wearing the things, it's a wonder that the design of the condom has barely changed over hundreds of years.

The drawback of having a prophylactic that is so widely disliked has even inspired the Gates Foundation to make the invention of the Next Generation of Condom one of their Grand Challenges in Global Health, a research initiative designed to find solutions to 15 global health problems. The foundations explains:

The one major drawback to more universal use of male condoms is the lack of perceived incentive for consistent use. We are looking for a Next Generation Condom that significantly preserves or enhances pleasure, in order to improve uptake and regular use.

Now, in response to the Gates Foundation challenge, a pair of PhD students have created a digital condom : a prophylactic that sends electrical impulses through the material to create pleasurable sensations.

Firaz Peer and Andrew Quitmeyer of Georgia Tech University have already put The Electric Eel (their name) through two prototype stages. The first used conductive threads sewn into a regular condom to add new sensations. A second prototype described by the researchers as soft stimulating sleeve (but that looks more like a sock) featured conductive arrays of electrodes along the sensitive underneath part of the shaft .

The pair are currently looking to fund their research through crowd-sourcing website Indiegogo.

Abstract

The addiction model is rarely used to describe high-frequency use of visual sexual stimuli (VSS) in research, yet common in media and clinical practice.

The theory and research behind pornography addiction is hindered by poor experimental designs, limited methodological rigor, and lack of model specification.

The history and limitations of addiction models are reviewed, including how VSS fails to meet standards of addiction. These include how VSS use can reduce health-risk behaviors. Proposed negative effects, including erectile problems, difficulty regulating sexual feelings, and neuroadaptations are discussed as non-pathological evidence of learning.

Individuals reporting addictive use of VSS could be better conceptualized by considering issues such as gender, sexual orientation, libido, desire for sensation, with internal and external conflicts influenced by religiosity and desire discrepancy.

Since a large, lucrative industry has promised treatments for pornography addiction despite this poor evidence, scientific psychologists are called to declare the emperor (treatment industry) has no clothes (supporting evidence). When faced with such complaints, clinicians are encouraged to address behaviors without conjuring addiction labels.

Nerve reports further

Dr. David Ley, author of a new study in the Current Sexual Health Reports, says that slapping the label of porn addict on net smut enthusiasts is not only missing the point, but ignoring the benefits of watching porn. Ley contends that fewer than two in every five research articles about high frequency sexual behavior describe it as being an addiction, and furthermore, a limiting 27 percent of articles on porn addiction actually contain any empirical data. In fact, in studies, there's been no evidence of any of the commonly hyped life-crushing negative effects of porn addiction, like erectile dysfunction and brain rewiring.

When we pathologize common sexual behaviors, even if they seem compulsive, we're also stigmatizing them. Frequently watching porn, even up to five hours a week, maybe could cause a mean case of carpal tunnel and near-sightedness, but it also increases positive attitudes towards sex, increases frequency of sex, decreases rates of sex crimes, and fosters open dialogues of sexuality between couples.

Statistically, people most likely to hop on the porn addict train are usually male, have a non-heterosexual orientation, have high libidos, and have religious values that conflict with their compulsions. Meaning: we like to diagnose things that run counter to our carefully constructed social and family values, when maybe, masturbating frequently is perfectly normal. Watching porn isn't accepted in every circle, so it became quite easy to call the behaviors of everyone --- from the helpless, to the hyper horny, to the completely ordinary --- an illness.

Porn addiction is also a business. The highly profitable conversation surrounding porn addiction is worrisome to Dr. Ley, who claims, we need better methods to help people who struggle with the high frequency use of visual sexual stimuli, without pathologizing them or their use thereof...Rather than helping patients who may struggle to control viewing images of a sexual nature, the 'porn addiction' concept instead seems to feed an industry with secondary gain from the acceptance of the idea.