How do you ?define? porn?

[MacTx]

I?m a partner of a long term pornography user and he?s said he will stop watching porn.  But that got me to thinking.  What all does that entail? To me it?s not just porn videos.  It?s cam sites, subreddits that are sexual in nature, chat rooms, exchanging of photos or videos, ?lifestyle, fashion, travel, exercise ? accounts on Instagram that are frequently barely clothed.
I guess overall in my mind I?m defining porn as any content on any platform or app that is sexual in nature?
I?m curious of others thoughts on this though.
Thanks!

 

[Sanders]

I'd just say masturbating to any artificial stimulation. Whatever videos, pictures, websites, blogs or anything someone uses to masturbate themselves to I'd consider part of the porn addiction. There's quite some information about YourBrainOnPorn if you haven't read it already, I'd advise to read through the website and get some info to understand what it does within the person. Just the action of masturbating 'towards' content lights up the same parts in your brain and therefore should be avoided.

 

[Fappy]

jerking off, or fingering etc if youre a woman, to anything atrificial could be considered "porn", though not in the traditional sense of pixels on a screen. anything that isnt a living human being whom you have feelings of affection toward (not counting prostitutes, lets not even go into that), that one masturbates to is damaging.
using artificial stimuli to get an orgasm and perhaps more importantly SEEKING after such stimuli makes it pornigraphic.

 

[Cyberian]

I agree with Fappy, it is the actively 'seeking' component that is of concern.  This seeking behaviour can affect our reward circuitry and lead to a loss of control.  This all reinforces the reward, motivation and memory circuitry.  Dopamine pathways having been created and reinforced leads the addict vulnerable to cue and stress induced seeking out.  Hence the great chance of relapse, as one may assume that life will throw things at you that will stress you out, challenge you.  As an addict, it will be difficult to resist all things pornographic by nature.

 

[Fappy]

I agree with Fappy, it is the actively 'seeking' component that is of concern.  This seeking behaviour can affect our reward circuitry and lead to a loss of control.  This all reinforces the reward, motivation and memory circuitry.  Dopamine pathways having been created and reinforced leads the addict vulnerable to cue and stress induced seeking out.  Hence the great chance of relapse, as one may assume that life will throw things at you that will stress you out, challenge you.  As an addict, it will be difficult to resist all things pornographic by nature.

Word.
I have heard, and can beleive it, that more dopamine is relased through the seeking phase than through the wanking phase. So we could call it SPMO: Seeking, Porn, Masturbation, Orgasm.
Back in the day i would spend hours just looking for the right video, then itd all be over in a minute or two. What an absolute waste!

 

[Sliced]

I think the ?seeking? part is really important.

My partner is newly in recovery from porn addiction and we have had a lot of conversations around what constitutes porn. What we?ve come to define it as is behaviours that cause the rush of dopamine as the dopamine is what he is really addicted to. We have found for him that the seeking behaviours are a massive part of this.

An example of this -
My partner was using porn tube sites, sex chatting to people, sending/receiving photos and videos, these we all class as porn as they were causing that dopamine rush. However, my partner was also messaging a number of girls he knew in real life, with no sexual content but reading these messages they were very robotic and compulsive, very frequent. No real connection or quality, very unlike the way he speaks and messages. We realised that this was part of the behaviour too, although we had initially overlooked these messages because of the lack of sexual content. He feels that he was getting dopamine from the ?seeking? of sending/ receiving messages.

 

[MosesY]

I am 53 years old, have been porn free over 7 months now. I read the book "Your Brain on Porn" and it made me see how it was affecting my relationships, it ruined my marriage, etc. I think the term "porn" in a committed relationship limits the context of what needs to be avoided. Any sexual stimulus outside of your partner needs to be avoided. There are a lot of things besides porn to stimulate you sexually.