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Q&A: The Researchers Who Analyzed All the Porn on the Internet from 19 May 2011 in TIME.com

I have a problem with a few things in this interview. They stem from the same root that can be summed up in this quote: 

I’m a computational neuroscientist. I view the mind as software.

Hmmm…does not compute.

OK, what I mean is thus: while their insights into online porn consumption are interesting (and refreshingly balanced), in this interview the authors do make some unfounded generalisations about human sexuality because they are constructing the human as a collection of 1s and 0s.

In terms of making the conclusions they draw more robust, it would have been helpful if they’d combined this data analysis with interviews or surveys or something human rather than patterns of a particular kind of (search) behaviour. I struggle to connect porn searches with the author’s non-data-based conclusions about motivations (“another fundamental difference between men and women…”), preferences (“men are wired to be sexually jealous”, “women are often aroused by women being submissive”) and outcomes (“Rather than making people want to go out and rape, it satisfies the urge.”). What they’ve got is what people search for, not how they feel (say it with me, folks: correlation is not causation).

Still, it’s useful to have someone translate a ginormous dataset about how people are navigating sex online. The dataset in question is approximately 400 million searches on Dogpile.com (do people *still* use Dogpile?!) between 2009-2010.

Read more about their results on the accompanying blog on Psychology Today.

HT @charlesarthur

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Cooper, A., Delmonico, D. L. and Burg, R. (2000). Cybersex Users, Abusers, and Compulsives: New Findings and Implications. Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity, 7(5): 5-29.

This study is more than a decade old. The authors describe cybersex activity as “pornography exchange, real-time discussions, and compact disk (CD-ROM) distribution.” But it serves to explain Cooper et al’s 1998 “Triple-A Engine”, a theory that has been used in research over the last 12 years to describe why the web is such a successful conduit for sexual activity.

In the original paper, the authors are more positive about sex online than much of the subsequent research that tests this theory.

Unfortunately, this article is behind a paywall, but for those without Ivory Tower access, here are a few quotes from my notes:

Anonymity, accessibility,  and affordability (Triple-A Engine) seem to increase the chances that the Internet will become problematic for those who either already have a problem with sexual compulsivity or those who have psychological vulnerabilities rendering them at risk for developing such compulsivity.

As an aside (and as was described in the Hate chapter), predicting “vulnerabilities” is a notoriously difficult task.

Another:

the power of anonymity, accessibility, and affordability (Triple-A Engine) interacts with certain underlying personality factors of at-risk users  and leads to patterns and behaviors that, without intervention, may deve lop into online sexually compulsive behavior. 

once again, “at risk” is the key thing here. not *everyone* who goes online becomes a raging sex fiend.

(Source: tandfonline.com)

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Park, Y., Lim, C. and Nam, T. (2010). CheekTouch: An Affective Interaction Technique while Speaking on the Mobile Phone. CHI 2012: 10-15 April 2010, Atlanta, GA.

I’m in danger of falling down a rabbit hole of haptic technologies…

full text pdf of the poster the researcher team presented at CHI in 2010.

Here’s the abstract:

We present a new affective interaction technique, called CheekTouch, by combining tactile feedback, delivered through the cheek, and multi-finger input, while speaking on the mobile phone. We designed a prototype by using a multi-touch mobile device and a 4x3 vibrotactile display device. We identified six affective touch behaviors (pinching, stroking, patting, slapping, kissing and tickling) that can be exchanged through one another’s cheeks while speaking on the phone. We mapped the affective touch behaviors on tactile feedback expressions of the vibrotactile display. Results of a preliminary user study suggest that our technique is positively evaluated by the participants and applicable to intimate and emotional communication.

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Greenberg, S. and Neustaedter, C. (2011). Shared living, experiences and intimacy over video chat in long distance relationships. Department of Computer Science, University of Calgary.

full text, in pdf.

I’m including this research paper with the sex chapter because I’m exploring all aspects of intimacy online here; although it might fall into the love chapter too, there I’m dealing with the perils and pitfalls of finding a relationship online. Intimacy is, of course, part of that story too.

Here’s the abstract:

Many couples live a portion of their lives being separated from each other as part of a long-distance relationship.  This includes a large number of dating college students as well as  established  couples who are  geographically separated because of situational demands such as work. Long distance couples often face challenges in maintaining some semblance of intimacy given the physical distance between them.  Traditional media helped here, where they would stay connected by physical letters, telephones, email, texting, and instant messaging. 

More recently, many couples resort to “hanging out” over the new generation of video chat systems in order to stay connected.  We explore this phenomenon by presenting case studies of  how couples in  long distance relationships hang out over video. Each couple is in a unique  relationship situation, yet all share increased intimacy over distance by leaving a video link going between their residences for extended periods of time.  These episodes involve couples participating in activities that are sometimes shared and sometimes not, where the key component is simply feeling the presence and involvement of the remote partner in day to day life.

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Manning, J. C. (2006). The Impact of Internet Pornography on Marriage and the Family: A Review of the Research. Sexual Addiction & Compulsivity, 13: 131-165.

This article is behind a paywall, but I have access to the full text as a Visiting Fellow at the LSE. So here are my notes.

to bear in mind: this is an article from 2006. That means this review does not consider the evolving ubiquity of web technology on devices like tablets and smartphones. Extremely unfortunately, there’s a one-year embargo on an article published in the same journal in a special issue on cybersex in April 2012 that updates this research, looking specifically at the impact on adolescents. For an abstract of that article, go here.

* Three points of methodological criticism. This is important when considering the validity of the reported results.

1) The most frequently cited studies about the negative impact of pornography in general (not specifically internet porn) have been criticised: 

(a) for being limited to experimental situations, (b) for lacking real punishment or social controls, (c) for using college students as the normative group, and (d) for the ethical inability to produce real violence (Davies, 1997).

2) Meta-analyses looking at the effects of general porn on, “(a) increased callousness toward women; (b) trivialization of rape as a criminal offense; (c) distorted perceptions about sexuality; (d) increased appetite for more deviant and bizarre types of pornography (escalation and addiction); (e) devaluation of the importance of monogamy; (f)  decreased satisfaction with partner’s sexual performance, affection, and physical appearance; (g) doubts about the value of marriage; (h) decreased desire to have children; and (i) viewing non-monogamous relationships as normal and natural behavior (Drake, 1994)” demonstrate positive correlations (CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION), but these are really very very small effects. Like really small effects, ranging from Pearson’s r’s of between -0.137 (pictorial nudity and aggressive behaviour) and 0.216 (violent sexual behaviour and consumption/aggression).

The strongest correlation you can get is +/- 1.0. The ones reported in this meta-analysis are very small (albeit significant) relationships.

3) The evidence of impact in most of the studies in this review come from clinical settings (a fact that Manning freely admits), but this is a common problem in this kind of research: as she says when making a concession for those couples and clinicians who describe porn as an “enriching aspect of marital intimacy” when “consumed, in a mutual, consensual, and open manner”:

couples who mutually benefit from pornography are unlikely to seek treatment or  encounter caregivers who are aware of related studies.

Thus the frame through which pornography research is often conducted problematises it de facto.

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results.

* “While I don’t think you can say the Internet is causing more divorces, it does make it easier to engage in the sorts of behaviors that traditionally lead to divorce” (Dedmon, 2002).

* offline research (supported by a qualitative study from 2002) indicates a decrease in emotional intimacy with with a partner when exposed to porn over time

* “women in relationships (married, engaged, or girlfriends) with men perceived as heavy (offline) pornography consumers, decreased and altered sexual intimacy is a common symptom.”

* online sexual content can be helpful in increasing intimacy when a user looks to it for education, community support and to meet new people, but when it’s an outlet for stress, it can have adverse effects on relationships - Cooper, Galbreath, and Becker (2004)

* why use it? Based on a sample of N=384 primarily heterosexual men, Cooper, Galbreath & Becker (2004 report:

1. 80.5% used online sexual activity (OSA) to distract themselves or take a break.

2. 56.5% used OSA to deal with stress.

3. 43.0% used OSA to engage in sexual activities they would not do in real life.

4. 25.3% used OSA to educate themselves.

5. 16.1% used OSA to meet people with whom to have offline sexual activities.

6. 11.7% used OSA to meet people to date.

7. And 9.1% used OSA to get support with sexual matters.

* on fidelity:

Internet pornography is associated with activities that can undermine marital exclusivity and fidelity. What cannot be determined, however, is what comes first—does Internet pornography influence unfaithful behavior or does unfaithful behavior coincide with preexisting traits that predispose someone to normalize Internet pornography viewing?

emphasis added

Monica Whitty from University of Leicester (the fantastic @cyberspy on twitter) is referenced in this paper (her 2003 paper, Logging onto Love: An examination of men and women’s flirting behaviour both offline and on the Internet); specifically, it’s her work on what’s considered (in)fidelity:

both men and women perceive online sexual activity as an act of betrayal that is as authentic and real as offline acts, and that Internet pornography use correlated significantly with emotional infidelity (N = 1, 117, 468 males and 649 females; r = .41, p < 0.001)

(now *that’s* what I call a Pearson’s r..)

Monica and her colleague Laura-Lee Quigley updated this study with a 2008 paper,  Emotional and Sexual Infidelity Offline and in Cyberspace (abstract only).

* impact on adolescents/kids:

According to figures from Nielsen//NetRatings (2005), in the United States during the month of April 2005, 4,803 children and adolescents  between the ages of 2 and 17 were exposed to or sought out pornography online. This age group also represented 13.97% of all online pornography consumption.

It’s really difficult to draw conclusions about the impact of online pornographic material on adolescents based on the studies Manning reviews because so much of it is so old (between 2000 to 2005), and so much has changed. However, she summarises the research thus:

Research shows that exposure to pornography can make a lasting impression in young people and that this impression is most often described using emotions such as disgust, shock, embarrassment, anger, fear, and sadness.

The consumption of Internet pornography and/or involvement in sexualized chat can harm the social and sexual development of youth and undermine their success in future relationships.

Pornography consumption in youth has been associated with earlier onset of sexual intercourse, as well as increased likelihood of engaging in anal sex and sexual relations with people they are not romantically engaged with.

The emphasis here is on exposure, rather than specific content (as many levy accusations against the web for escalating more extreme activity).

(Source: ingentaconnect.com)

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Cindy Gallop, creator and curator of the website Make love, not porn, in her 2009 TED talk. 

Another lovely quote from the 4-minute talk:

Porn tends to present one world view. Porn says, ‘this is the way it is.’ And what I want to say is, ‘not necessarily.’

— I pulled this quote out of my notes from Coping With Threatened Identities by Glynis Breakwell (1986: Routledge; Chapter 3: The structure of threats) that I took during my MSc.