Mobile Pornography

Pornography has been around for awhile.  The ancient Greeks and Romans created public sculptures that depicted sex acts you cannot see in R-rated movies still today.  Shortly after photography was invented in 1826, photos of nude women surfaced.  From magazines to DVD’S to the the Internet, pornography is available everywhere.

As youth are increasingly exposed at earlier and earlier ages, (the national average for boys is 11), the obvious implication is that access is easier.  When there is a demand, supply will always meet that demand.  Technological devices merely facilitate the reality that we are sexual beings.

While the mobile pornography market surfaced in the last decade, most do not know that mobile consumption is largely credited in 2009  for saving much of the pornography industry.  With youth today accessing the Internet from their phones, PlayStation’s or X-Boxes, tablets, or even a handheld PSP,  entry into the world of porn is certainly easier than in the days of my youth where access to pornography was largely restricted to magazines or movie theaters.

One of the trends we have been tracking here amongst youth at the Paul Anderson Youth Home is where they first access pornography.  66% of our current young men have first viewed pornography via the Internet at ages as early as 8.  While the earliness of the age is staggering, it however is largely a foregone conclusion that their first point of access will be the Internet.  But the next level that we are seeking to discover now is what is the first device they use.  Is it a computer, a phone, tablet, or a gaming device like an X-Box.  Two recent articles certainly support what we expect to see; that it will become far more prevalent for youth to first see porn over their phone via an application, the Internet, or even an image that they have received via a text message.