Rates, Age, & Impact of Exposure to Pornography
Pubertal Timing, Parenting Style, and Trajectories of Pornography Use in Adolescence: Peer Pornography Use as the Mediator.
Open Access: No.
Abstract
This study examined the effect of pubertal timing, parenting style, and peer behaviors on the trajectories of pornography use among adolescents. Data consisted of 1272 boys and 1210 girls, who completed at least three waves of pornography use questions from 7th to 12th grade (the year 2007 to 2012). Group-based trajectory modeling was applied to identify the trajectories of pornography use. Multinomial logistic regression and the Z-mediation method were conducted to examine the influences of pubertal timing, parenting style, and peer behaviors on the trajectories and the mediating effect. The results showed that early puberty was associated with earlier exposure to pornography and more frequent exposure later. Parental monitoring protected adolescents from pornography use, whereas psychological control increased the chance of more exposure. Peer pornography use mediated the relationship between adolescent pornography use, pubertal timing, and parental style. This mediating effect was stronger among boys versus girls. These findings provide insight into the mechanism of pubertal timing, parental style, and peer influence on the trajectory of pornography use in adolescence.
Relevance
“Parental psychological control was associated with more pornography use in Taiwanese adolescents, and parental monitoring protected the adolescents from exposure to pornography.”
(“adolescents who reported high parental psychological control associated with more deviant peers, and peer influence was associated with more risky development in pornography use. On the other hand, adolescents who reported high parental monitoring tended to associate with peers with less deviant behaviors and were less likely to use pornography.”)
“Our result also showed that boys and girls had a higher chance of being early-start frequent users and increasing users if using pornography was more common among their friends, and peer influence was more prominent than parental influence.”
Additionally, although of less importance, “Early developed girls were more likely to be early-start frequent users and increasing users. On the other hand, late developed boys were less likely to be early-start frequent users.”
Citation
Nieh, H. P., Chang, L. Y., Chang, H. Y., Chiang, T. L., & Yen, L. L. (2019). Pubertal Timing, Parenting Style, and Trajectories of Pornography Use in Adolescence: Peer Pornography Use as the Mediator. The Journal of Sex Research, 57(1), 29–41. https://doi.org/10.1080/00224499.2019.1623163
