Any books/academic articles on porn addiction?

You've likely already read it, as you mentioned the site, however, if not, Gary Wilsons Your Brain On Porn is an absolute must and will expand your knowledge like no other.

 

You should check out the September copy of National Geographic, there's a well written piece about how scientists' understanding of addiction is changing and the impacts it has on how addiction is treated. It's not PMO specific, but it confirms everything that yourbrainonporn.com is telling us (not that the website needs any confirmation to start with, all their articles are well referenced).

 

There is a wealth of information out there these days. One book which i found really interesting is called 'The Bioligy of Desire , Why addiction is not a disease' By Marc Lewis. Another one is 'The Porn Trap, by Larry and Wendy Maltz' and there is 'In the Shadows of the Net' by Dr Patrick Carnes. All of these are available through Amazon or can be ordered through any good book shop.

Counter to Marc Lewis' views on addiction you have the book of Alcoholics Anonymous for those with a more spiritual outlook or who are willing to explore the idea of a higher power, 12 steps for me, along with meetings and getting a sponsor was my biggest help but it's not for everyone.

One thing i've learned in recovery is that knowledge avails us nothing unless it is put into action, we have to be willing to take leaps of faith sometimes in trying out new things which might be out of our comfort zone, things like starting a new hobby, trying to socialise more, more exercise etc. Life style changes are important for the brain to develop new pathways.

Some interesting articles on the internet can be found on the NCOSE website (National Centre On Sexual Exploitation) here :
http://pornharmsresearch.com/

Some essays about the neuroligy and psychology behind porn consumption can be found here:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3050060/

 

There is a very recent study published titled Can Pornography be Addictive? An fMRI Study of Men Seeking Treatment for Problematic Pornography Use. fMRI here is a brain imaging method that can look at changes in blood flow in the brain (i.e. what parts are getting activated).

I can't find the full text but here is the abstract:

Pornography consumption is highly prevalent, particularly among young adult males. For some individuals, problematic pornography use (PPU) is a reason for seeking treatment. Despite the pervasiveness of pornography, PPU appears under-investigated, including with respect to the underlying neural mechanisms. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we examined ventral striatal responses to erotic and monetary stimuli, disentangling cue-related 'wanting' from reward-related 'liking' among 28 heterosexual males seeking treatment for PPU and 24 heterosexual males without PPU. Subjects engaged in an incentive delay task in the scanner, in which they received erotic or monetary rewards preceded by predictive cues. Blood-oxygen-level-dependent responses to erotic and monetary cues were analyzed and examined with respect to self-reported data on sexual activity collected over the 2 preceding months. Men with and without PPU differed in their striatal responses to cues predicting erotic pictures but not in their responses to erotic pictures. PPU subjects when compared with control subjects showed increased activation of ventral striatum specifically for cues predicting erotic pictures but not for cues predicting monetary gains. Relative sensitivity to cues predicting erotic pictures vs monetary gains was significantly related to the increased behavioral motivation to view erotic images (suggestive of higher 'wanting'), severity of PPU, amount of pornography use per week, and number of weekly masturbations. Our findings suggest that, similar to what is observed in substance and gambling addictions, the neural and behavioral mechanisms associated with the anticipatory processing of cues specifically predicting erotic rewards relate importantly to clinically relevant features of PPU. These findings suggest that PPU may represent a behavioral addiction and that interventions helpful in targeting behavioral and substance addictions warrant consideration for adaptation and use in helping men with PPU.

 

It's studies like this which I think are really important to bridge the gap between moral/religious arguments against porn and the scientific arguments against porn. These days I think many people can't or wont relate to a spiritual argument but when it's been tested using scientific methods it can bolster our understanding and help aid prevention of the other adverse effects of porn use.

 

Agreed @thorswrath32. One of the disadvantages of our secularly-minded societies is that unless something is 100% validated we are inclined to automatically dismiss it. This means a lot of good things are treated in the same way as 'throwing the baby out with the bathwater'. Scientific validation is of course important, but so is common sense and personal experience. Empirical validation is the last step in confirming truth, not the first.

 

I agree with both sakeen and thorswrath32. I'm new to recovery from PMO, but I've been sober from alcoholism for 13 years and I'm a scientist by training. In my opinion, addiction has a spiritual component, and a "spiritual transformation" was recognized by Carl Jung as a remedy for it. Metaphorically, addiction has been compared to a desperate search for a connection to the infinite (or to the Divine, if you will) through finite or ordinary means. Of course, one can't get there that way, unfortunately. The experience of religion and spirituality have been studied in the brain, and light up some of the same areas that addictive behavior does. Don't have that reference handy, but I'm motivated now to go dig it up. Thanks for the insightful posts!

 

Thanks @SlowHand ...please let me know if you find it! Whenever I reconnect with my faith and reaffirm my belief I find that my desire for porn and other escapist activities stops

 

Here is a decent introduction to Neurotheology, as some are calling it:

http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/29/health/religious-brain-mormon-mri/index.html

 

@SlowHand ..trippy link name "Mormon MRI"

What did you get out of that? Science in general, or the religious connection part?

 

Yes, the link name is kinda bogus--but hey it's CNN. There are other good (better?) links that pop up on a Google search for Neurotheology. What I'm driving at is the points made earlier in this thread (which I hope we're not hijacking now too badly) about purely secular approaches to recovery and the tendency to discount spiritual aspects in favor of science. The two are related, as experiencing spirituality/religion can also be studied on a neurological basis as well. I'm not a religious person, but neither am I an atheist. To me, addiction is a malady which affects me physically, mentally, and spiritually.

 

The way you've framed it, this looks like a topic that might interest some of our NoFap associates like @Arohamystic.