A review of pornography use research: Methodology and results from four sources

Michael Gmeiner; Joseph Price; Michael Worley

doi:10.5817/CP2015-4-4

A review of pornography use research: Methodology and results from four sources

Vol.9,No.4(2015)

Michael Gmeiner Joseph Price Michael Worley

https://doi.org/10.5817/CP2015-4-4

How to Cite:

Gmeiner, M., Price, J., & Worley, M. (2015). A review of pornography use research: Methodology and results from four sources. Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 9(4), Article 4. https://doi.org/10.5817/CP2015-4-4

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Abstract

The widespread electronic transmission of pornography allows for a variety of new data sources to objectively measure pornography use. Recent studies have begun to use these data to rank order US states by per capita online pornography use and to identify the determinants of pornography use at the state level. The aim of this paper is to compare two previous methodologies for evaluating pornography use by state, as well as to measure online pornography use using multiple data sources. We find that state-level rankings from Pornhub.com, Google Trends, and the New Family Structures Survey are significantly correlated with each other. In contrast, we find that rankings based on data from a single large paid subscription pornography website has no significant correlation with rankings based on the other three data sources. Since so much of online pornography is accessed for free, research based solely on paid subscription data may yield misleading conclusions.

Keywords:
Pornography; internet use; data; representative

Author biographies

Michael Gmeiner

Michael Gmeiner will graduate with a BS in Mathematics and a BS in Economics from Brigham Young University in December 2015. He will begin graduate studies in Economics in fall 2016.

Joseph Price

Joseph Price received a BS in Economics from Brigham Young University in 2003 and a Ph.D. in Economics from Cornell University in 2007. He is an Associate Professor of Economics at Brigham Young University.

Michael Worley

Michael Worley holds a J.D. in Law, and a B.A./B.S. in Economics/Mathematics, both from Brigham Young University.

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