With the increasing unrestricted access to the internet, teens become at risk of exposure to sexually explicit videos that can negatively impact their health and relationships.
Having access to sexually explicit videos during adolescent years has various long-term detrimental effects on sexual maturity, sexual behavior and personality development. Sexual curiosity tends to peak during puberty, which is one cause that leads teens to view arousing videos.
Before the development of social media, it was common to view pornography via magazines or VCR tapes. According to WifiTalents, today, mobile devices account for over 70 percent of traffic to pornographic websites. As technology has developed, people, specifically adolescents, have easier access to pornography, including via their social media apps.
“Tik Tok, Instagram and Snapchat are frequently where people make sexual jokes or advertise porn,” senior Angie Llanos said. “This is why it’s so normalized for kids because they are all over these apps.”
According to Common Sense Media, 73 percent of teens in a 2022 study reported having consumed pornography, with the average age being 12. Out of that 73 percent, 15 percent of those teens reported having viewed porn at 10 or younger.
“Putting aside all the unethical behaviors or practices of that industry, what teenagers are watching is not typically what happens in a healthy sexual relationship,” Psychology teacher Arturo Tenacio said.
Teens are often more sensitive to sexual content due to their immaturity, which can frequently lead to a multitude of mental health problems. According to the National Library of Medicine, cross-sectional surveys have found that pornographic usage in teens can lead to lower-life satisfaction, low self-esteem and symptoms of depression.
“Porn never shows you how to ask for consent or make sure your partner is okay,” senior Isabella Romero-Ellis said. “Having access to porn just ruins the real meaning of intimacy with your partner and yourself.”
When consuming sexually explicit videos, unrealistic expectations may be reflected on how teens view those around them.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, sexual scripts expect men to prioritize their pleasure over others, often leading to treating women as purely sexual objects. Women are then expected to use their bodies to look desirable for men and minimize their own desires.
Standards like these can cause negative behavior or self-image in those who consume pornographic material, causing them to attempt to mimic what they see without realizing the damage it could cause to themselves and others.
“The true problem is that with everything we watch, the brain can perceive it as real,” Tenacio said. “But in actuality, everything [you are watching] is rehearsed or made up and repeated as many times as necessary to get the ‘perfect’ take.”
Pornography can also be additive, due to the body being aroused, which causes a surplus of dopamine in the brain. Dopamine, the neurotransmitter that is associated with our reward drive, is transmitted when teens engage in stimulative activities such as watching sexually explicit videos. Being exposed to sexually explicit material young, can lead to the development of an unwanted addiction due to the lack of understanding of what is truly being consumed.
According to the Council of Recovery, teens’ brains are the most sensitive to dopamine around the age of 15 and react four times more strongly to images perceived as arousing. A teen’s brain is at its peak of dopamine production and neuroplasticity, making it highly vulnerable to addiction and rewiring as their brain is not yet finished developing.
As teens begin developing that curiosity about sexual behaviors and acts, it’s important for them to be able to learn from a source that’ll allow them to understand how to practice safe sex. Pornography blurs the line between realistic and unrealistic sex, only proving the harm it truly causes to those who consume the material.