Bad News for Cyberporn: Internet Sex Linked to Depression, Anxiety

internet sexThink your real-life relationships are unsatisfying? Well, consider this before you look for love and companionship in the extra-human realm. A study last month by Australian researchers found that men who have cyber sex had “alarmingly high” rates of depression, stress and anxiety.

The study surveyed 1,325 men from the U.S. and Australia who spent an average of 12 hours a week engaged in Internet sex activities, including porn, online chats, and Web cams. The men were then evaluated for mental health. More than a quarter (27 percent) were moderately to severely depressed, 30 percent had high levels of anxiety, and 35 percent were moderately to severely stressed. The most avid cybersex users were also the most severely depressed.

The researchers caution, to the relief of many, that the correlation doesn’t mean porn causes depression, or that sad people flock to porn. Although, for those in the latter group, previous research has indicated that simulated sex doesn’t cause the same release of stress-relieving, love-inducing brain chemicals as the real thing.

Still, try telling that to Tacihi Takashita, a Japanese man who’s fallen in love with a cartoon character. Now he’s campaigning for the legal right to marry the fictional character. “I am no longer interested in three dimensions. I would even like to become a resident of the two-dimensional world,” he wrote in an online (of course) petition that has already gathered more than 1,000 signatures.

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Image: flickr / [rom]

November 4th, 2008 Tags: , ,
by Nina Bai in Sex & Mating, Technology Attacks! | 3 comments | RSS feed | Trackback >

3 Responses to “Bad News for Cyberporn: Internet Sex Linked to Depression, Anxiety”

  1. meet my google reader « mo in rho Says:

    […] meet my google reader I’m somewhat obsessed with my Google Reader.  It’s a great tool and without it gathering all the information in the tight little package that it does, I wouldn’t get to be exposed to nearly as much as I’d like to be.  I’m just too lazy to scroll through all of those web-pages individually.  If something ‘trips my trigger’ as my grandma would say, I’ll post it on here.  Expect lots of science-y types links, some politics and certainly a lot of random pop-culture paraphernalia. Go Flirt with a Human […]

  2. doorman Says:

    Internet porn is a terrible escape from the reality of life. Not only can it be addictive but the scars one can incur can last a lifetime.

    As co-founder of My Internet Doorman, a company dedicated to educating parents and teens about the True Dangers of Internet Porn, I have heard many first hand accounts of adults who have lost their jobs, their spouses, and their self respect because of this porn parasite. These risks obviously would be a huge source of stress and anxiety, clearing data, wondering when you will be found out! Several clients have compared porn to cocaine, in that they will risk anything to get a fix; this clearly indicates a loss of control.

    It is important to filter the internet and avoid exposure to inappropriate material. The average age of exposure is only 11 years old… and in most cases occurs while doing homework! Kids and adults are forced to navigate their way around a minefield of porn traps such as kidpicks, a misspelled porn portal that catches kids and parents looking for www.kidspicks.com. The fact that traditional filters are not doing the job, should be a clue as to how difficult it is to hit this moving target (hundreds of new porn sites per day).

    Seeing that educating parents and teens was only half the job; we developed the first fully managed internet filter service. This service has been greatly welcomed and has proven to be a powerful assistance in protecting oneself and one’s family from inappropriate material on the web—and for some, a crucial step in breaking a porn addiction. An encouraging trend we are witnessing is that a growing number of adults want to block porn for themselves. They are finding that our fully managed filter service is exactly what they were looking for.

    Mr. M - My Internet Doorman

    To the point of:
    With respect to pornography addiction, an individual probably maintains some degree of control over the addiction.

    As co-founder of My Internet Doorman, a company dedicated to educating parents and teens about the True Dangers of Internet Porn, I have personally spoken to many adults who have lost their jobs, their spouses, and their self respect because of this porn parasite. Several clients have compared porn to cocaine, in that they will risk anything to get a fix; this seems to indicate a loss of control.

    It is important to filter the internet and avoid exposure to inappropriate material. The average age of exposure is only 11 years old… and in most cases occurs while doing homework! Kids and adults are forced to navigate their way around a minefield of porn traps such as kidpicks.com– a misspelled porn portal that catches kids and parents looking for www.kidspicks.com. The fact that traditional filters don’t do the job, should be a clue as to how difficult it is to hit this moving target (hundreds of new porn sites per day).
    Seeing that educating parents and teens was only half the job; we then launched the first fully managed internet filter service. This service provides the necessary assistance in protecting oneself and ones family from inappropriate material on the web and for some it has been the first step in breaking the porn addiction. This growing trend of adults who want to block porn for themselves is encouraging.

    Mr. M - My Internet Doorman My Internet Doorman

  3. Luke Says:

    I had a deeply rooted porn addiction. Not too long ago I was interviewed on Dr. Kevin Skinner’s radio program, “Pornography As I See It.”

    http://www.covenanteyes.com/blog/2008/11/12/breaking-free-of-porn-addiction/

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