Internet pornography by the numbers; a significant threat to society

Internet pornography by the numbers; a significant threat to society News media organizations often treat specific internet safety issues as fads – after being THE hot topic, issues fall out of favor becoming “old news” in spite of ongoing risks and threats. We’ve seen this with pornography, child predators, chat room risks, meeting strangers and, more recently, sexting. Today’s hot topic is cyberbullying, but given the nature of our media cycles, we should expect to see this join the ranks of “old news” by the end of the year. That isn’t to say these topics aren’t ongoing threats, just that they lose media attention. Internet pornography was the first big internet safety topic to make news, and it has remained largely out of favor among the popular press ever since. But that doesn’t mean the issues and costs have vanished, or that “it’s just an issue among right-wing prudes.” The societal costs of pornography are staggering. The financial cost to business productivity in the U.S. alone is estimated at $16.9 Billion annually ; but the human toll, particularly among our youth and in our families, is far greater. According to Patrick F. Fagan, Ph.D, psychologist and former Deputy Assistant Health and Human Services Secretary, “two recent reports, one by the American Psychological Association on hyper-sexualized girls, and the other by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy on the pornographic content of phone texting among teenagers, make clear that the digital revolution is being used by younger and younger children to dismantle the barriers that channel sexuality into family lifeii. Pornography hurts adults, children, couples, families, and society. Among adolescents, pornography hinders the development of a healthy sexuality, and among adults, it distorts sexual attitudes and social realities. In families, pornography use leads to marital dissatisfaction, infidelity, separation, and divorce.” Here are some of the most credible statistics available today on internet pornography. Note: at the end of this article there are links to three infographics that cover various aspects of the impact of pornography on families. General pornography stats Every second 28,258 users are watching pornography on the internet Every second $3,075.64 is being spent on pornography on the internet Every second 372 people are typing the word "adult" into search engines 40 million American people regularly visit porn sites 35% of all internet downloads are related to pornography 25% of all search engine queries are related to pornography, or about 68 million search queries a day One third of porn viewers are women Search engines get 116,000 queries every day related to child pornography 34% of internet users have experienced unwanted exposure to pornographic content through ads, pop up ads, misdirected links or emails 2.5 billion emails sent or received every day contain porn Every 39 minutes a new pornography video is being created in the United States About 200,000 Americans are “porn addicts” Youth pornography stats Teenagers with frequent exposure to sexual content on TV have a substantially greater likelihood of teenage pregnancy; and the likelihood of teen pregnancy was twice as high when the quantity of sexual content exposure within the viewing episodes was highviii. Pornography viewing by teens disorients them during the developmental phase when they have to learn how to handle their sexuality and when they are most vulnerable to uncertainty about their sexual beliefs and moral valuesix A significant relationship also exists among teens between frequent pornography use and feelings of loneliness, including