This is your brain on porn
interesting ted talk here:
[url]http://yourbrainonporn.com/[/url]
this researcher brings up a lot of interesting concepts in this ted talk. i wonder about the parallels between the effects of porn on the brain versus the effects of fkk use on the brain.
a few blurbs:
apparently, it's not just nudity that excites us but novelty of experience also plays a big role. our brain releases dopamine in our brains for every novel sexual exposure. apparently, according to this researcher, our brains rewires itself to reinforce this cycle. so, the earlier in life we are exposed to high speed internet porn (i. e. unlimited sexual novelty) , the more our brains will rewire itself in this way.
research studies about the effects of using internet porn are hampered by the inability to find control groups. one researcher observed that he couldn't find any college-aged males who weren't using internet porn. that's funny.
he mentions some psychological effects of internet porn addiction. apparently, our brains are wired to reward ourselves with a pleasure response upon arousal, which in turn reinforces our cravings for more. ultimately though, he says that the addicts experience a "numbed-pleasure response" upon excessive porn consumption, requiring more and more exposure to more and more extreme porn, leading to will-power erosion, and changes to the frontal cortex. like other addictions, use of too much internet porn leads to a less activation based on similar stimuli.
who cares? apparently, too much internet porn is affecting sexual performance of young men. erectile dysfunction. their brains experience less sensitization from exposure to porn the more they use porn.
he then talks about porn-induced erectile dysfunction and the number of months one has to be away from porn to be cured from porn-induced erectile dysfunction, which interestingly differs for young men versus old men. he hypothesizes that the difference in time periods is due to the timing of the arrival of high speed internet. apparently, old guys didn't have high speed porn when they were young, so their brains didn't rewire themselves in the same way that the young guys brains are rewiring themselves today, so old guys only have to give up porn for 2 months to recover from porn-induced erectile dysfunction whereas young guys have to go without for 4-5 months.
anyways, this whole talk makes me wonder, not about internet porn but about my use of fkk's. it reminds me of a chat i had in living room one evening with a german guy and his dutch friend during the dinner. back then, i was fairly new to the fkk scene, and i remember him telling me that the more time you spend in the fkk's, the more crazy stuff you will get into later, and the more you will go down the slippery slope so to speak. we all start out just with the normal blowjob / sex, but then before you know it, it seems like the older guys are getting into weirder and weirder stuff. this guy i was chatting with started out normal like me, but then started telling me about all the weird shit he is into now. so, it makes me wonder if i'll become one of those guys one day.
i suspect that the fkk use contributes to the extreme withdrawal feeling i experience when i'm away. the first week back is tough. the intense loneliness is tough. it gets easier after a few weeks away, but man, that first week of withdrawal is tough. then, the obsessive thoughts are another thing that makes me wonder. sometimes, i think about fkk's pretty much all day, every day. i wonder if there are some parallels between this guy's research and fkk use.
i suppose it's probably so much easier for you guys who live there in germany. you don't have to experience the withdrawal like those us living on another continent. you can go satisfy your cravings whenever you need to. then again, maybe i'm lucky i don't live there, which puts a natural cap on my number of fkk visits.