The pseudoscience behind public health crisis legislation

Making Sense of Jiese: An Interview Study of Members from a Porn-Free Self-Help Forum in China

About 6 million men in China engage in jiese (abstaining from masturbation and porn) and call themselves jieyou (porn-free self-help community members). In this article, we sought to unpack how the idea of jiese took root in Chinese historical, social, and cultural contexts by interviewing 32 jieyou. Guided by the sensemaking theory, we conducted a critical discourse analysis of participants' responses and ended up identifying four major themes: embodied experiences, jiese as rational and noble, reconstructing the subjectivity of jieyou, and nationalistic sentiments. We found out that jieyou tended to justify their abstinence by seeking sources of legitimacy in traditional Chinese culture, the ideology of healthism, science, and patriotic discourses. We argue that jiese reflects young men's contradictory cultural practices of conservatism, self-medicalization, and neoliberal governmentality.

Religiosity, Perceived Effects of Pornography Use on Personal Sex Life, and Moral Incongruence: Insights from the German Health and Sexuality Survey (GeSiD)

Although online pornography use appears to be a mainstream activity, there is little information, particularly outside of the USA, about how consumers perceive its impact on their sexuality. Considering increasing concerns about pornography use, this lack of evidence has sociocultural and clinical ramifications - especially because the recently proposed Moral Incongruence model (MI) suggests that some individuals may see their pornography use as problematic independently of the frequency of use. Using data from 4,177 adults from the 2018-2019 national probability-based German Health and Sexuality Survey, we explored self-perceived impact of pornography use on personal sex life and the role of MI. Most participants (61.7%) reported no impact of pornography. Women were characterized by significantly higher odds of reporting positive relative to no impact, while men had higher odds of reporting mixed/negative compared to no impact. Participants in both the positive and the mixed impact group reported a significantly higher frequency of pornography use than participants in the no impact group. In line with the MI model, we observed a significant relationship between participants' religious upbringing and self-perceived negative (relative to mixed) impact of pornography use. Social relevance and clinical implications of the findings are discussed.

"Pornography Addiction": Elements for Discussion of a Case Report

Can Internet pornography use (IPU) lead to addiction? "Pornography addiction" is a highly controversial concept within the scientific community. In the absence of consensus, international classifications do not consider that the concept meets the criteria to be recognized as a distinct diagnostic entity. However, the term "pornography addiction" has now become common parlance and is therefore present in the discourse of patients seeking therapy to address what they perceive as problematic pornography consumption. Drawing on a brief case vignette, presenting the case of a man who views himself as a pornography addict, we offer a critical review of this concept. Different diagnostic hypotheses will be considered. Beyond the diagnostic process, we consider the issue of "perceived addiction" and its relationship with "moral incongruence." From a psychotherapeutic view, we suggest that patients who self-identify as "porn addicts" must be supported using a more comprehensive approach that goes beyond their symptomatic behavior or the manner in which they present or perceive themselves. The proposed therapy did not seek or require an end to the behavior. The therapy approach focused on exploring the patient's history in an attempt to understand the construction of his sexuality and morality. In the case analyzed, focusing on the source of moral incongruence led to the disappearance of IPU and all associated suffering.

Self-Assessed Effects of Pornography Use on Personal Sex Life: Results from a Large-Scale Study of Norwegian Adults

Objectives: The study explored characteristics associated with the self-assessed effects of pornography use on one's personal sex life. Methods: Data were collected in a probability-based sample of Norwegian adults (n = 4,160). Results: Most participants (41.3%) did not believe that pornography affected their sex life. More participants reported positive (33.2%) than mixed/negative (25.5%) effects of pornography use. Sociodemographic and sexual characteristics that predicted these self-assessments were examined. Among participants in a steady relationship, emotional intimacy and relationship satisfaction were unrelated to the self-assessed effects. Conclusions: The current study findings add to scant literature about the self-assessed effects of pornography usage.

The Role of Religiosity in Adolescents' Compulsive Pornography Use: A Longitudinal Assessment

Despite increasing concerns that adolescent men are vulnerable to developing compulsive pornography use, little research has been done in this area. Given recent theorizing and research concerning moral incongruence, we hypothesized that symptoms of compulsive pornography use should generally be associated with higher levels of pornography use and increased growth in male adolescent pornography use over time, but that this pattern would be attenuated among very religious participants. These hypotheses were tested with mixed effects growth models using two independent panel samples of male Croatian adolescents. As expected, adolescent men who reported features of compulsive pornography use tended to exhibited higher levels of pornography use. However, contrary to expectations, increased growth in pornography use was limited to more religious compulsive users. Compared to nonreligious compulsive users, these adolescents started with lower initial levels of pornography use and their use increased over time at a greater rate of change. This study's results are the first to suggest that some adolescent men who report high levels of pornography use tend to exhibit symptoms of compulsive use, which highlights a need for counseling and therapeutic attention. Our findings also have implications for the emerging theory of moral incongruence.