Men Who Frequently Watch Porn More Likely To Experience Erectile Dysfunction, Study Suggests

Researchers have uncovered a link between watching porn and erectile dysfunction, with a new study indicating that men who spend more time viewing x-rated sexual content tend to have more trouble getting it up when having sex with a partner.

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The findings were presented at the European Association of Urology Congress, which took place online from July 17 to 19. The as yet unpublished study involved a total of 3,267 men from Belgium and Denmark, who responded to a questionnaire about sexual experiences, pornography, and masturbation habits. Results showed that 23 percent of men under the age of 35 who reported watching porn frequently also tended to encounter erectile dysfunction during sex.

“This figure was higher than we expected,” said study author Gunter De Win in a statement. “We found that there was a highly significant relationship between time spent watching porn and increasing difficulty with erectile function with a partner, as indicated by the erectile function and sexual health scores.”

More research is needed in order to figure out the causes of this trend, although De Win believes that the increasingly explicit nature of online pornography may leave some men underwhelmed by sex in real life. “There’s no doubt that porn conditions the way we view sex,” he explained. “In our survey, only 65 percent of men felt that sex with a partner was more exciting than watching porn. In addition, 20 percent felt that they needed to watch more extreme porn to get the same level of arousal as previously. We believe that the erectile dysfunction problems associated with porn stem from this lack of arousal.”

Meanwhile, a separate study presented at the congress provided evidence for a shift in the nature of sexual issues that are causing European men to seek treatment. Published in the International Journal of Impotence Research, the paper found that by 2019, men were 30 percent more likely to attend a sexual clinic because of concerns about the shape of their penis than they were a decade earlier.

Irregular curvature of the penis – also known as Peyronie’s disease – is often caused by scar tissue that forms inside the shaft, and seems to be bothering men more than it did in 2009.

The study involved 3,244 men who attended a sexual health clinic in Italy over a 10-year period and found that the number of patients reporting low sexual desire also increased by 32 percent during that time.

“We need to be clear about what these figures mean,” said study author Paolo Capogrosso. “They do not indicate any change in the prevalence of these conditions, what they show is why men came to the clinic. In other words, it shows what they are concerned about.”

“The changes probably also reflect the availability of treatments; as treatments for sexual conditions have become available over the last few years, men are less likely to suffer in silence.”

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