For a lot of people, both male and female, watching porn is a favorite pastime. However, a new study that was released shows that it can have a significant effect on regions of your brain if you’re a man.
A German study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association states that men who watch porn have a decrease in the volume and activity centers of the brain that are tied to reward and motivation. Dr. Simone Kühn, the study’s lead author from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin, Germany has stated, “It’s not clear, for example, whether watching porn leads to brain changes or whether people born with certain brain types watch more porn.”
Kühn noted that the study shows evidence of a link between watching porn and a decrease in brain size and activity in response to sexual stimulation. The study looked at a control group of men between the ages of 21 and 45, observed brain activity and questioned their porn viewing habits. The results were startling. Per Kühn, “We found that the volume of the so-called striatum, a brain region that has been associated with reward processing and motivated behavior was smaller the more pornography consumption the participants reported. Moreover, we found that another brain region, that is also part of the striatum that is active when people see sexual stimuli, shows less activation the more pornography participants consumed.”
The study can be found by going to the Journal’s website at archpsyc.jamanetwork.com
