This study examined correlates of pornography acceptance and use within a normative (nonclinical) population of emerging adults (individuals aged 18-26). Participants included 813 university students (500 women; M age = 20 years) recruited from six college sites across the United States. Participants completed online questionnaires regarding their…

Defines pornography, the aspect of sexuality which evokes most attention from the media, and discusses findings of the President's Commission on Obscenity and Pornography and of psychologists who have recently found that exposure to a portrayal where violence and sex are coupled does increase subsequent aggression toward a female. (MBR)

Notes that short-term exposure to nonviolent sexual media stimuli can produce cognitive changes in men which can affect their behavior toward women. Explores differences among these behavioral effects in a group of male and female undergraduate students based upon sexual degradation in film content and male viewers' gender schematicity. Discusses…

Concludes that subjects with considerable prior exposure to common, nonviolent pornography preferred to watch uncommon pornography. Male nonstudents preferred it almost exclusively, as did male students to a lesser extent. Females also exhibited this consumption preference, though it was far less pronounced, especially in female students. (JD)