Porn Use and Eating Disorders May Be Correlated, But Reddit Says Don’t Panic

A recent study published in the International Journal of Eating Disorders found that women who self-reported feeling more pressure to be thin, as well as preoccupations with body fat, were more likely to be partnered with men who watched more porn.

Researchers at the Ohio State University reported “a clear association between eating disorder symptoms and porn usage,” based on an analysis of 409 women’s answers to a questionnaire. The women averaged 34 years in age and were from a variety of backgrounds, the researchers said.

“The study is one of the first to look at how a romantic partner’s behavior might be linked to the likelihood of a woman experiencing or engaging in such things as extreme guilt about eating, preoccupation with body fat, binging or purging,” according to the Ohio State University news website. As such, it’s preliminary. 

Still, headlines have sprouted all over the internet, screeching, “Man’s Porn Obsession May Fuel Eating Disorder in Partner” and “Women whose male partners watch more porn are at greater risk of eating disorders because they feel ‘sexless and insecure in their bodies.’”

Wow. Tracy Tylka, the lead author of the study and psychology professor at Ohio State University, did muse that women whose partners watch a lot of porn could “feel sexless because their partners are spending time with porn instead of connecting with them,” but she also told reporters that further research is warranted in these areas before conclusions are drawn.

While the media is going bananas over porn and eating disorders, the thoughtful folks at Reddit, of all places, are putting the study’s results into perspective and questioning the accuracy of the data collected.

One Reddit user called laulau711 posted, “They asked the women to report how much porn their partner watched. To the hour. How would anyone know that?”

And user jbielik23 postulated: “Perhaps woman with body image issues overestimate their partners interest in other woman’s [sic] bodies.”

Thanks, jbielik23. A good head on one’s shoulders isn’t easy to come by when it comes to porn and eating disorders.

Image By Laura Lewis via Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License