Why do women watch porn

If we take an interest in how the pornography industry works today, we find that women today not only take part in its production, but also bring such videos a huge number of views. Unfortunately, even today there is little research that focuses on women and porn. Obviously, we do not understand well the motives that guide them when they watch films “with three X’s”.

However, women’s interest in pornography is growing. In 2019, Pornhub released a study that shows the preferences of the female audience on the site. Despite the established stereotype that men love to watch women gay games, Pornhub has proven that among the latter there are 151% more lovers of lesbian videos than among men.¹.

In The New Look at Pornography, gender researcher Shira Tarrant and sexologist Lowe Lynn Komella write that women often watch pornography to connect with their bodies, while men watch it out of boredom. Perhaps the increased interest in same-sex porn helps women better understand their sensuality².

Here are the top 4 reasons why women watch porn.

1. Learn to accept your body

A 2010 study shows that sometimes pornographic videos negatively affect women’s self-esteem. Usually we are talking about films where sexuality is presented in the form of an unnatural, “glossy” picture. The bodies of the actors are exceptionally young and elastic, the foreplay is beautiful and long, the sexual intercourse can last for hours.

Numerous surveys prove that among porn users there are those who take what is happening on the screen at face value and get upset when comparing reality porn with what happens in real life. Also, participants in one of the studies said they would like to have bodies like those of porn actresses.³. Here we are faced with the idealization of the sexual image of a woman.

However, there is another group of viewers. They understand that porn is different from real sex in the same way that the fantasy world is different from real life. There are those who choose more naturalistic types of porn. And in this case, watching “adult” videos helps to accept yourself and come to terms with the features of your body. For example, in one study, women reported that the videos allowed them to see that different shapes and sizes can be attractive, helped them feel “normal”⁴.

2.Get information about sex

In most countries, the level of sexuality education in schools is completely inadequate to meet the needs of the younger generation. It asks intimate questions earlier than in past centuries. Attempts to introduce censorship do not give the desired result. If schools do not deal with this issue, if parents themselves do not talk to children about sex, they get answers to questions in porn, use it as a “visual material” for sex education.

Today we do not live in an information vacuum, but for many adults, pornography is still a source of information about sexual life. It is more accessible than special literature, despite the fact that the information that is offered to us in such videos often does not correspond to what actually happens in our beds.

3.Learn to enjoy sex and understand your identity

Our sexuality changes over time. And at different ages, women solve different problems with the help of porn:

• teenagers want to better understand their body and their desires⁵;
• adult women want to know their identity, gain new experience⁶.

4. Get excited

It’s not for nothing that we put this item at the very end of the list of tasks that women solve with the help of pornography. The most familiar and familiar way of “using porn” is not the main one in the context of the relationship between a woman, her body, her fantasies and, in fact, pornography.

But indeed, women quite often use porn for arousal, and in this their strategies differ from men: they more often watch pornography solely for the sake of relaxation, the “final chord”.

What do women want? Let’s ask them ourselves!

We invited women we know to answer the question why they watch porn. The responses were surprisingly varied:

“Pornography provides clues to diversify real sex and in new ways to please yourself.”

“Porn makes sex fun and spontaneous.”

“I like watching porn. It helped me understand my sexuality, understand what sex is and how it can be done. I got acquainted with many stereotypes about how a person “should” look, and also realized that people with a variety of shapes, sizes, features can be desirable. It helped me feel comfortable in my body. Plus, porn is fun.”

“If I didn’t have the opportunity to watch porn, I would be disappointed, because with it I can fulfill fantasies that I would never have realized in real life.”

“Porn shows how different sex can be, and also suggests what you can think of in bed.”

The question of the ethics of porn remains open. Indeed, such videos demonstrate the female body as an object of desire, which contradicts modern views on the place of a woman in the world. In addition, actresses who star in films of this genre regularly complain about violence from film partners and share the dark sides of their profession. In the meantime, porn giants continue to shoot materials, and some studios make videos specifically for women, taking into account their tastes.

The increase in women’s interest in porn means that the stereotype of sexuality as a territory of male pleasure is a thing of the past. More and more women allow themselves to search the Web without hesitation for those images to which their sexuality responds best.

Women want emotions to be brighter, arousal stronger, they want to achieve orgasm. So, porn definitely has at least one plus for women: it not only helps to understand themselves, but also brings pleasure.

¹ https://www.pornhub.com/insights/women-of-the-world

² New Views on Pornography: Sexuality, Politics, and the Law Lynn Comella and Shira Tarrant, Editors, 2015, стр. 272

³ Eck, 2003, p. 697; Cavaglion & Rashty, 2010, p. 280

⁴ Hare, Gahagan, Jackson, & Steenbeek, 2014, 2015; Mattebo et al., 2012

⁵ Basin, 1999; Erickson, 1968

⁶ Choi & Nicolson, 1994