Porn Addiction can cause or worsen social anxiety

[Mike555]

Check those testimonies
A life changer: From a guy who had extreme social anxiety to start feeling normal again. | Your Brain On Porn
Age 25 - ED, mild OCD, generalized & social anxiety, femdom fetish & prone masturbation: but I made it! | Your Brain On Porn
1 year - ED, laziness, back pain gone. Much more productive, emotional, focused, motivated, talkative, and engaging. | Your Brain On Porn
Age 20 - ED cured, plus many other positive benefits (2nd reboot) | Your Brain On Porn

This site is full of it.. you can see plenty of them more here Your Brain On Porn | Evolution has not prepared your brain for today's Internet porn

And there's a scientific study over here Start here for an overview of concepts & science | Your Brain On Porn

I did read it couple of times my self and it's too much to read, very interested but i'll tell you shortly how it works and how it harms.

When ever you watch a porn video, it releases a chemical in your brain called "Dopamine" and after many years of watching and it becomes an addiction which you can't even quit.. and you watch it a lot .. then you'll be on low dopamine.

When the person has low dopamine, he becomes un-motivated, very lazy, way less social, worsens social anxiety, depressed and much more..

Source about the dopamine thing - Are you lazy? Maybe your brain is just wired that way… | JOE.ie

Quotes from there - I just googled why i'm so lazy so probably porn is the cause.

The chemical, dopamine, is known for having an influence on motivation and feelings of reward when something is achieved.
Their research suggests that more dopamine in the anterior insula area of the brain causes a reduced desire to work, even if money is offered as a reward. In the past dopamine has always been considered to enhance reward-driven behaviour.
The study shows that dopamine can have opposite effects in different parts of the brain. This discovery could complicate how health issues like ADD, depression and schizophrenia are treated in the future.
So there you have it. You’re not lazy, you just have too much dopamine in your anterior insula.

 

[wrongdirection]

I just a paper on this. It's very interesting. Like any addiction it becomes a vicious cycle. I think for those with social anxiety it's could be just as damaging as turning to drugs and alcohol. Emotionally you lose the ability to connect or bond in a relationship, unrealistic expectations are formed. It's hard to say too which comes first, the social anxiety or the porn addiction, but they seem to feed each other.

 

[Metal_isthe_Answer]

So I have to ask, what would qualify as porn addiction? A guy who looks at porn everyday? A guy who looks at porn everyday but will put it aside to do other things (and who doesn't feel an overwhelming urge to go watch more porn, like they fell anxious etc...)?
I ask because a friend.....

 

[MikeyC]

So I have to ask, what would qualify as porn addiction? A guy who looks at porn everyday? A guy who looks at porn everyday but will put it aside to do other things (and who doesn't feel an overwhelming urge to go watch more porn, like they fell anxious etc...)?
I ask because a friend.....

I'm not a doctor, but an addiction is something that gets in the way of regular life. So, an alcoholic will need alcohol to just feel normal, and will have serious ramifications if there is no alcohol. I would say that porn addiction becomes an insatiable need to watch porn that interferes with regular duties.

I believe that watching any porn is detrimental to men, but when it comes to an addiction, then it can become a serious issue leading to erectile dysfunction among other things.

 

[Odo]

Porn addiction will worsen social anxiety in the same way any other addiction will, but the idea that porn itself is somehow ruining people (men) sexually seems pretty misguided. Plenty of men watch porn and still have normal sex lives. I find most of the critiques applied to porn can be applied to masturbation in general, and you don't really hear people speaking up against that.

It's hard to imagine someone preferring it to the real thing, or confusing porn with reality... and if young men are looking to porn to 'teach' them how to interact with women, then it mostly signals that there needs to be more honest discussion about sex and less hiding it away or trying to pretend it doesn't exist.

I think it makes a convenient scapegoat, especially in North America, where people are already uptight about sex. It's stupid to blame porn for every single guy out there who never managed to get over his nervousness around girls while he was a teenager.

Quitting porn isn't going to make you automatically less misogynist, more appealing to women, or more confident. You probably need to do some soul searching to accomplish that.

 

[Bronson99]

I think it makes a convenient scapegoat, especially in North America, where people are already uptight about sex. It's stupid to blame porn for every single guy out there who never managed to get over his nervousness around girls while he was a teenager.

Aye, I completely agree. This attitude is just a transformation from what used to be religion-based shaming.

 

[Metal_isthe_Answer]

Being single a long time I have almost always looked at porn. I've decided to see if some of what I've read is true about how it can dampen mental focus. I'm going to either not look at porn any more and see if I notice a change, or reduce it to soomething like once a week.

 

[Bronson99]

Being single a long time I have almost always looked at porn. I've decided to see if some of what I've read is true about how it can dampen mental focus. I'm going to either not look at porn any more and see if I notice a change, or reduce it to soomething like once a week.

It's logical to think it could dampen mental focus if:

1) You have AD/HD. For a simple reason, if you have ADD you will crave quick rewards more than the average person: more stimulation = more distraction.

2) You have a genuine porn addiction. Any serious addiction can cause problems for anyone.

Otherwise I don't think it's seriously problematic, at least not much more than other quick-reward, low-effort activities.

 

[Metal_isthe_Answer]

I have noticed in the past few years that i have had difficulty remembering things, not ADD so much, but learning something and forgetting about it within a day, that's what made me give it some consideration. I actually ended up doing some online quizzes and reading up on the issue and pretty much everything says I don't have an addiction.

One question was: "Do you decline to spend time with friends to watch porn?"
I thought of one of them calling me and me replying: "I'd love to hang out out but I've got some porn to catch up on."

 

[AriAbs]

I watch every week. I think I'll watch something kinky tomorrow.