00:00We're going to answer that question. I'm Doctor Rena Malik
00:02Urologist and Pelvic Surgeon and if you're new here, I make
00:05content weekly on sexual health, bladder health, urologic
00:08health, and so much more. If you like what you see, make sure
00:11you subscribe and share this channel with your friends.
00:20Before I get started, I want to be 100% clear. I strongly
00:24believe that no one should be shamed for their sexual
00:27behaviors as long as they're not damaging themselves or
00:31damaging others and quite frankly, pornography is
00:34everywhere. People are going to get exposed to it and maybe
00:36even have problems with it. So let's take a deep dive into the
00:39scientific research about pornography. So first off, who
00:43uses it? Well, depending on the study up to seventy to 80% of
00:47men have used pornography or use it regularly and up to 32%
00:50of women. Interestingly, traffic to pornography sites
00:53increased by 11% during the COVID pandemic and people use
00:57pornography for a number of different reasons to increase
01:00sexual desire to satisfy their curiosities about sex and
01:04sadly to learn about anatomy because let's face it, sexual
01:08education is limited if not mediocre at best. Is
01:11pornography black or white good or bad? Well, there's not one
01:15right answer for every person. So I'm going to ask each of you
01:19to please watch this video in its entirety to learn the pros
01:22and cons of pornography before you make your decision. On the
01:26positive side, people have shown that pornography users
01:29have a more positive attitudes towards sex. They may be
01:32willing to experiment more with their partners and have a more
01:35satisfied sexual life because of it and in the moment,
01:38watching pornography usually causes people to feel good and
01:41lastly, some studies have shown particularly in women that
01:44watching pornography increases their sexual satisfaction and
01:47libido and people who watch porn with a partner actually
01:51find that they're more dedicated to their partner and
01:54more sexually satisfied and I know a lot of people worry
01:57about watching abusive and damaging pornography and how
02:01that can cause maybe sexual violence, but there has been no
02:04linkage after looking at multiple studies with
02:06pornography and increases in sexual violence, rape or
02:10assault. So when does pornography become a problem
02:13across multiple studies up to four to 10% of people find that
02:18they have a problem with porn use or may self identify as
02:21having a porn addiction. Medically porn addiction is not
02:24a classified disease. What people in the medical field
02:27call it is problematic pornography use. So who's at
02:30risk for getting problematic pornography use watching more
02:34pornography does put you at higher risk, but doesn't in and
02:37of itself mean that you have a problem. Also, if you have
02:40depression or anxiety on top of watching a lot of pornography
02:44that puts you at a higher risk as well. If you find yourself
02:47having moral incongruence or feeling that morally
02:50pornography is bad, you're more likely to have a problem
02:53due to pornography use. Lastly, if you find yourself
02:56preferring masturbation to pornography than having sex
03:00with your partner or a real person, then that's also a sign
03:03that you may have a problem. If you think you have a problem,
03:05you probably do. So how does this actually happen? Let me
03:09explain how pornography affects our brains and our behaviors.
03:13Our brains are often exposed to a neurochemical called
03:17dopamine. It makes us feel good and our brains are wired to
03:20look for things that give us dopamine and those are usually
03:22things that help sustain our bodies and help sustain our
03:25species and sex is one of those things because sex leads to
03:28fertility, which leads to propagation of humankind and
03:31when you watch pornography, your brain releases the same
03:34chemicals that get released during sex dopamine. So
03:38watching pornography and people who develop this problematic
03:41pornography use have up regulations in pathways in our
03:45brain that cause us to look for these dopamine pathways over
03:49other things that we normally would do. So your brain starts
03:52developing cravings for pornography and even signs of
03:56things that may be similar to other addictive substances like
03:59drugs. For example, you may develop a tolerance so you'll
04:03watch some pornography and you may need to find more novel
04:06more aggressive or different types of pornography to get the
04:10same sort of enjoyment from watching it. You also get
04:13impulsivity and compulsivity. What that means is you get
04:16strong sudden urges to watch pornography and you
04:20compulsively do them. You keep repeating it regardless of the
04:23negative consequences that might occur and you get what's
04:26called a weakened executive function. What that means is
04:29your brain when it tells you to do things that are good for
04:32you. So like go to work, take a shower, pick up your kids from
04:35school, just normal activities, but when you have this pathway
04:39up regulated, you actually impair that executive function.
04:42So you're less likely to do things that you normally would
04:45do and lastly, you can get dysphoria and so what that
04:49means is that you start feeling very frustrated and unhappy in
04:52other parts of your life when you're not watching pornography
04:55and this all of this taken together can really impact your
04:58willpower and willpower is actually not the best way to
05:01get rid of these cravings and we'll talk about how to get rid
05:04of this problem. If you are finding yourself having
05:07problematic pornography use in a video to follow so when all
05:11this is going on in your brain, what happens to people in real
05:14life? Well, you'll find yourself avoiding doing normal
05:17daily activities spending time with family or friends rather
05:20than going to work finding yourself watching pornography
05:23instead. This can lead to social isolation feeling very
05:26lonely and having very few connections. It can lead to
05:30financial problems where you're spending more and more money to
05:33use pornography and it can cause problems in your
05:36relationships more than that people can find themselves
05:39getting signs of real mental health disorders like
05:42depression or anxiety where you're feeling constant sadness
05:45or constant worry and what about your sex life? Here's
05:49where some of the problems come in people are accessing
05:52pornography at younger and younger ages. In fact, boys are
05:55accessing pornography as early as 10 years of age and in fact,
05:59I'm going to make a video of how this could be detrimental
06:02to younger kids and how to talk to your kids about pornography
06:05also coming up. So make sure you subscribe to my channel and
06:08turn on that notification bell so you can make sure you don't
06:10miss these new and upcoming videos. So these younger
06:13children who are watching pornography don't have fully
06:17developed brains and they have difficulty discerning what's
06:20reality and what's fake and pornography if you're not aware
06:24is a fake product. It is not real life. This is not how
06:27normal sexual encounters occur. This is a highly edited
06:31product with lighting with special effects and all sorts
06:35of things that can make sex seem like something very
06:38different from what it really is and quite frankly, a lot of
06:41pornography is aggressive abusive and doesn't show you
06:45how you actually need to pleasure your partner. These
06:48actors in pornography are not average people. They have above
06:52average length penises. They have special effects to make
06:55look like they have higher volumes of semen and they are
06:59immediately erect and women are immediately lubricated, which
07:02is not at all what happens in real life. If you want to learn
07:05more about how to pleasure women or about an anatomy of
07:08women, please check out my previous videos. I've done some
07:11great interviews with Lisa Mungo, Dr. Kelly Casperson and
07:14Dr. Laurie Mintz about how to pleasure women and I made a
07:17great video about female anatomy so you can understand
07:20exactly how and women do derive pleasure based on their
07:23anatomy. The real issue with this fake production of
07:26pornography is people can start really having self esteem
07:29issues. So they start thinking like, oh, am I good enough
07:33because I don't look like that or am I pleasuring my partner
07:37well enough because they're not responding like the woman
07:40on the porno video did. All of this taken together can lead to.
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