What Internet Porn Does to the Brain

You can watch internet porn 24 hours a day if you want to. I don’t care. I only want you to do it as an educated choice. My position on porn is not a moral one, it is a position based on physiological facts. Porn hurts your brain and your sexuality.

Many say the world wide web was initially funded by porn industry. It may be so. I haven’t bothered to check. I am not interested in the financing of the web I am interested in what porn does to the brain. I have seen the devastating effects of what “being hooked on porn” does to people and families. As a trauma and addiction therapist I have seen the effects on the brain when people spend time watching porn. So I would like to present you with some facts.

I will begin with an explanation of what happens when we look at a computer screen.

Screens are basically a steady light with pictures and icons imposed over them.

Without the light we wouldn’t see anything. So we are basically looking at a steady light. Our eyes are not geared to look at light directly. We don’t look at the sun, we don’t look at light bulbs or flashlights etc. Our eyes are made to take in light diffusely.

If we look at a steady bright light (the computer screen) we go into “startle”. Just like the deer caught in the headlights we actually freeze. Our brain freezes, we become immobile and our natural defense mechanisms are compromised. We can’t react normally. Like the deer we are caught in a trance and flooded with adrenaline.

How many of you have gone to the computer to check your email and said “I’ll be 5 minutes” and then 20 minutes later you shake your head and say “What happened, where did the time go?” I am sure we all have. What actually happened is you were caught in the freeze and trance of the steady light. Your brain was high-jacked. AND don’t try and say it was because of the content of the emails. That is just laughable.

When we are watching internet porn the same thing happens. We get caught in the trance. But when we are watching porn there is another dynamic going on. Watching porn we are aroused and our body releases androgen, the sex hormone. However, because we are watching porn on a computer, we are also releasing adrenalin, the fear, excitement hormone, because we are in “startle”.

These two hormones combine to make a chemical cocktail we usually don’t have when having sex with a person.

When we are making love with a person we don’t have adrenalin we have the combination of androgens and vasopressin, the bonding hormone.

Porn, therefore, is more exciting because it has adrenalin and is less bonding because it does not have vasopressin. The porn cocktail stimulates the reward center of the brain with it’s new chemical combination and begins to shift the sexual arousal template.

The arousal template is a construct in our brain that dictates what we are attracted to. Everyone has an arousal template. We call it our “type”. The arousal template is developed in childhood. It is based on several factors, culture, early experiences, family values, religion and education to name a few. They all layer on one another to give us an imprint of what we find arousing.

The optic nerve is the next important aspect of the dangers of internet porn. The optic nerve is the only cranial nerve that has direct access to the outside world. All the other cranial nerves are protected with tissue and muscle and bone. The optic nerve is connected to the retina at the back of the eye. Everything we see goes directly into our brain.The porn industry is very savvy about this fact and they are aware of the brain’s need for variety. This is why they developed the “pop up”.

The impact of the pop up on the brain and the arousal template is immediate and lasting.

If you are looking at porn in a book or magazine and see something, that to you is disgusting, you can immediately turn the page. When you are watching porn on the computer and a disgusting pop up comes on you are in “startle”, you are compromised and you think you can click it off immediately but you can’t. Those few seconds have given the image time to be burnt into your arousal template.

As most porn is basically “eroticized rage” our arousal becomes more associated with power-over rather than connection.

I have had clients come in terrified because they have seen pop ups that disgusted them but now find themselves attracted to those kinds of images or persons. It takes time and effort to get those out of the brain and restore the arousal template.

So in summary, internet porn uses the steady light of the computer screen to high-jack the brain, it uses pop ups to capture the brain’s need for variety and it shifts the arousal template away from connection. Pretty clever and effective.

I believe people need to be aware of the danger regarding internet porn. Do you want your sexual arousal and experience based on what you actually desire or by what an industry, that thrives on exploitation of your brain, wants it based on? That is the question.