Chances are, you don't really think about your porn-watching habits all too much. But according to a new study, maybe you should. Research published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine found that there are three types of porn-watchers — but only one of them is actually healthy.
Researchers at the Université Laval in Quebec, Canada, categorized the types of porn-watchers as follows: Recreational, compulsive, and distressed.
The researchers gathered a sample of 830 participants and asked them about their porn-watching habits as well as their overall sexual satisfaction, tendencies to avoid sex, and possible sexual dysfunction. They specifically asked how hard they tried to access porn, how they felt after watching it, and how compulsive their use was.
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When they broke up the participants into groups, they found some interesting results: 75% of respondents fell into the "recreational" group, with an average of 24 minutes of porn-watching per week as well as relatively low scores for the porn-use questions. The group, researchers found, was mostly made up of women and people in relationships.
12.7% of people fell under what researchers called the "highly distressed non-compulsive” group, with an average of 17 minutes of porn viewing per week and high levels of emotional distress after watching porn. And 11.8% fell under the "compulsive" group, where they watched an average of 110 minutes of porn per week, and had high levels of compulsivity but moderate levels of distress.
While porn-watching habits vary greatly from person-to-person, the research sheds some light into the effects that porn can have on people. The results? Porn probably doesn't present any problems for people's overall well-being.