Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2007. / The entire dissertation/thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file (which also appears in the research.pdf); a non-technical general description, or public abstract, appears in the public.pdf file. Title from title screen of research.pdf file (viewed on October 10, 2007) Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

A pesquisa acadêmica sobre pornografia permaneceu por um longo período monopolizada pela lógica texts and effects; ou seja, a investigação se orientava pela busca de consequências (em âmbitos individual, interpessoal e social) supostamente desencadeadas pelo consumo de materiais pornográficos. Essa linha de pesquisa contribuiu para a polarização do debate científico, fomentando a conformação de retóricas pró e antipornografia. Embora esse tipo de pesquisa ainda prevaleça nas publicações internacionais, desde o final da década de 1980 novos estudos passaram a interrogar a pornografia sob outras perspectivas. A presente pesquisa busca se filiar a esse campo de investigação recente, mas que já rendeu frutos significativos nacional e internacionalmente. A partir de um roteiro procedimental inspirado no método iconológico de Panofsky e ferramentas teórico-conceituais tomadas de empréstimo à psicanálise, elegemos a categoria \"Pornô com história\", da produtora Brasileirinhas (maior empresa do gênero em atividade no país), como fonte de dados. À época da coleta (maio-julho/2017), a categoria contava com 83 filmes, dos quais três foram excluídos do nosso estudo por serem produções estrangeiras. A decisão de trabalhar com filmes dotados de uma narrativa ficcional se deu em função da própria dimensão da pornografia que buscamos aqui dar relevo, a saber, sua natureza fantasística. A visualização de cada filme foi acompanhada da descrição iconográfica atenta a elementos como cenário, roteiro, personagens e diálogos. O material acumulado foi organizado a partir de três eixos: cenários, vocabulário pornô e representações dos sexos. A pesquisa argumenta que o pornô da Brasileirinhas constrói uma representação particular do erotismo que, ao mesmo tempo em que se dirige quase que exclusivamente ao público masculino heterossexual, busca se distanciar de práticas que fujam da heteronormatividade. Enxergamos no conjunto de palavras-fetiche que caracterizam o vocabulário da representação pornográfica manifestações de uma posição ambivalente perante o objeto sexual. Por último, argumentamos que a pornografia oferece a seu público uma solução utópica para ansiedades masculinas em tempos de crescente igualdade entre os gêneros e problematização da masculinidade. Essa solução utópica se materializa em aspectos como a representação de personagens femininas facilmente disponíveis para o sexo, o falo impassível e dotado da capacidade de proporcionar prazeres extraordinários (para si e para outrem). / Academic research related to pornography remained for a long time monopolized by the texts and effects logic. This means that scientific investigation was guided by the search of individual, interpersonal, and social consequences supposedly caused by the consumption of pornographic material. This line of research contributed to the polarization of the scientific discussion and stimulated the conformation of the rhetoric in pro/anti-pornography positions. Although this kind of research still prevails in international publications, studies began to analyze pornography under other perspectives by the late 1980s. The present work seeks to join this new line of studies that have already produced meaningful outcomes in Brazil and internationally. Following procedures based on Palofskys iconological method and managing theoretic and conceptual tools provided by psychoanalysis, we elected the Pornô com História category from Brasileirinhas website (greatest Brazilian pornographic film studio still in activity) as our data source. The category comprises 83 films; three of them were excluded from our study due to being foreign productions. The decision to work with films endowed with a fictional narrative was based on the very dimension of pornography we want to highlight, namely, its fantastical nature. The visualization of each film was followed by the iconographical description of scenarios, plots, characters and dialogues. The collected material was organized into three axes: scenarios, pornographic vocabulary and gender representations. We observed that Brasileirinhas pornographic films present a particular representation of eroticism: while addressed to a male heterosexual public, they try to keep distance from non-heteronormative practices. We also noted the presence of ambivalent behavior toward the sexual object in the fetish-words that constitute the pornographic vocabulary. Finally, we concluded that pornography offers a utopian solution for male anxieties in times of increasing gender equality and problematization of masculinity. This utopian solution is materialized in female characters easily available for sex and the impassive phallus endowed with the capacity to provide extraordinary pleasures (for itself and for others).

Although there is a good foundation of feminist research at the intersection of performative labor, pornography, and sexuality, there are few (if any) published studies that examine race in porn content intended for gay men’s consumption. What’s more, existing research samples solely from corporatized porn, which is expressly produced, scripted, and directed. Bound by the conventions of the market, however, corporate pornography must abide by a consumer demand that reflects white machinations of black sexuality rather than the self-proclaimed sexual identity of African American men. Instead, I employ an exploratory content analysis of pornographic videos categorized as “ebony” on a popular user-submitted porn database. I am interested in 1) the character of pornographic representations of queer black masculinity and 2) how these representations vary between corporate and non-corporate producers. I find that representations of black men in gay porn rely on stereotypes of black masculinity to arouse consumers, especially those which characterize black men as “missing links” or focus excessively on their “dark phalluses.” Moreover, these depictions consistently separate gay black and white men’s sexuality into bifurcated discursive spaces, thereby essentializing sexual aspects of racial identity. Lastly, though such depictions are less prevalent in user-submitted videos, overall, both user-submitted and corporate content reify stereotypes about black masculinity.

The prevalence of male-centric pornography has been attributed to accepted (heteronormative) notions of gender specific sexual arousal, with men being characterized as visually stimulated and women naturally more aurally and emotionally receptive (cf. Christensen 1990, Faust 1980, Soble 2002). It has been argued that “if women reject the freedom to enjoy pornography and even male cheesecake, it must be because – no matter what permissions society gives us – women do not want it” (Abramson and Pinkerton 1995: 184). As women are not imagined as the intended recipients of these materials, this study was interested in how women connect their use of sexually explicit materials to their sexual biographies in the on-going process of (re)presenting their sexual identities. I wanted to not only explore what women conceptualize as sexually explicit materials and how they make sense of what they are seeing, but how and why these materials are used, the meanings attributed to these materials and the pleasures derived from them. To this end, 26 women between the ages of 25-35 were interviewed, either individually or as part of a focus group. A theoretical analytic, which bridged interactionist accounts of meaning-making and Foucauldian accounts of discourse, discipline and docile bodies, was articulated to account for how pornographic spectatorship is created, maintained and regulated. Regulation and resistance were situated within broader understandings of sexual scripts and governmentality, focusing on the construction (meaning-making) and deconstruction (resistance) of understandings of mainstream/malestream pornography. This research resulted in two interesting outcomes: (a) the redefinition of ‘gaze’ to account for active female spectatorship, as described by the women who participated in this study; and (b) discussion surrounding the ‘ethical use’ of pornographic materials, conceptualized via a governmentality lens. For the women who participated in this study, engaging with sexually explicit materials was not a passive experience. The narratives elicited demonstrate that these women did not merely absorb pornographic representations unquestioningly; they interrogated them, both subconsciously and consciously, brought new meanings to them and understood them through a decidedly female gaze – their own. These findings suggest a disruption to the assumption of female sexual passivity reverberated throughout patriarchal society.

There is no consensus in the research on how those in a mental health profession should view pornography use. Hence, clinicians have taken various approaches to working with clients presenting with problematic pornography use. For such clients, Brigham Young University has created the Sexual Concerns Groups. Seventeen current, previous, and future group members, along with four group leaders, participated in focus groups for this study. We used collaborative hermeneutic interpretation to understand the experience of participants in these groups, and we identified five main themes: Shift in the Therapeutic Focus, Confronting Sexual Avoidance, Spirituality, Interpersonal Relationships, and Self-Perception. We discuss implications for these groups and future research.

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Approximately 40% of U.S. women in married or cohabitating heterosexual relationships have a partner who uses pornography more than once a month. Some studies demonstrate a negative association between the frequency of male partners’ pornography use (PU) and women’s sexual satisfaction and relationship satisfaction, while others find no association. These mixed findings may be due to moderating influences of women’s religiosity, attitudes, and diverse meanings given to PU (e.g. addiction, gendered norm, inspiration), which have not been adequately studied. The current study included a sample of 625 women (mean age=44, diverse SES, 86% White), recruited through a Qualtrics research panel, who were married or cohabitating with a man who had used pornography in the prior 3 months. Study aims were to investigate (1) pornography-related distress, attitudes and meanings given to a partner’s PU, (2) the relationship between perceived frequency of partners’ solitary PU (PFREQ) and women’s pornography-related distress, relationship satisfaction and sexual satisfaction, (3) contributions of attitude and religiosity (commitment and conservatism) to distress and satisfaction, and (4) associations among attitudes, religiosity and meanings, and among meanings, distress and satisfaction. Self-report measures included the Partner’s Pornography Use Scale, Pornography Distress Scale, Couples Satisfaction Index, Global Measure of Sexual Satisfaction, Multidimensional Religious Ideology Scale, Religious Commitment Inventory, Biblical Literalism Measure, Pornography Meaning Scales, and an item measuring attitudes towards pornography. Participants endorsed a range of PFREQ (median frequency=1-2 times/week) and attitudes (28% negative, 34% neutral, 38% positive). Partial correlations and multiple regressions, controlling for demographic variables and COVID-19-related stress, indicated that higher PFREQ was significantly associated with women’s higher pornography-related distress, lower relationship satisfaction, and lower sexual satisfaction. Attitude and PFREQ made independent contributions to distress and satisfaction. Negative attitude amplified the negative association between PFREQ and relationship satisfaction, and religious conservatism amplified the positive association between PFREQ and pornography-related distress. Findings support and extend previous research regarding the associations of higher PFREQ and negative attitude with greater distress and lower relationship and sexual satisfaction, the contribution of religiosity to greater distress, and the role of meanings of infidelity, sin, addiction and inadequacy in predicting greater distress and lower satisfaction.

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A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Art, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfilment for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Media Studies, 2017 / ABSTRACT Practices of Pleasure: Exploring porn consumption in South Africa Despite its enormous global lucrative charge, porn remains an under-researched topic in media studies, especially in Africa. Consumption theories which shed light on how people acquire, use and dispose of products (Aldridge 2003) can be used to explain the various ways people attain pornography and their motivations. In the context of South Africa, where pornography only became legal 20 years ago (1996), we still don’t have sufficient research that illuminates on the uses leading to the expansion of explicit media. Most research projects addressing the topic of porn in South Africa porn do so by engaging its textuality and discourses surrounding it. Pamela Ramlagun’s work on teenage girl’s consumption of porn is the only known work in South Africa to tackle pornography through those who use it. Still, this work is mainly qualitative and does not offer an encompassing national outlook. It is also not clear how South African porn consumption practices deviate from or converge with other consumption practices in other global economies. What can pornography consumption in South Africa tell us about South Africans? This research proposes to find out “why do people watch porn?” (motivations), “which types of porn do people watch?” (preferences), “what are people hoping to get when they watch porn?” (needs) and “what do people think about certain aspects of porn?” (beliefs). In determining the various consumption patterns of pornography consumers, this study utilised a mixed method approach, a large anonymous survey and in depth interviews. A total of 676 survey responses and 25 in depth interviews were recruited. Phase 1 of this research comprised the survey stage. An online questionnaire which remained open for 6 months gave porn consumers within the country an opportunity to participate in the study. The survey was hosted on an online survey hosting site called Qualtrics so that anyone in South Africa could access it. Information about the survey was advertised on the Sunday Times newspaper which is considered the largest weekly paper nationally. Various online fora such as Chat24, ZaGossip, Facebook and Blogspot were also used to mete out information regarding the study. Readers were informed the research sought to investigate porn usage in the South Africa and that in order to participate they had to be porn consumers, be at least 18 years of age, and be residing in South Africa at the time of completing the questionnaire. The link to the online questionnaire was also included. Once all the survey data had been collected, I exported it to SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) for analyses. Phase 2 of the data collection process comprised interviews. Interview respondents chose their preferred mode of interviewing i.e. a face-to-face session, a recorded phone-call conversation, a WhatsApp mobile chat or an online live-chat. Information about the interview phase was distributed on Blogspot, Facebook and Chat24. All participants of the survey were guaranteed both anonymity and confidentiality. Where it was impossible to grant anonymity to the interview respondents (e.g. face-to-face interviews) confidentiality was assured. Interviews were transcribed and a coding schema was manually developed for the analyses of the interview data. Data reveals that African1 porn consumers often use borrowed, pirated and free porn whereas their white counterparts mostly afford to buy original DVD’s or pay for home internet which they use to download and/or stream quality porn material. Porn is thus revealed to be a commodity whose attainment reflects national socio-economic inequalities where white minority citizens possess greater wealth than the African majority. In South Africa, porn also proves to fill the glaring crevices of sexual education in a prude socio-cultural milieu where many parents and educators deliberately eschew the topic of sex. Furthermore, South Africa is a nation bereft of access and circulation of its own porn with most porn consumers indicating to watch only international explicit content. Not surprisingly, many survey respondents felt there wasn’t enough porn in South Africa. Lastly, porn consumption in the country is modulated by a contradictory legal framework which grants sexual consent at age 16 yet disbars porn till adulthood, making many consumers who possess and view porn as teenagers criminally complicit. / GR2018