- Porn and your brain.
I hope this video makes you OnePercentBetter.
Now over to Alexis from the channel Lifelong Learners.
- [Alex] Thanks for the introduction Brandon.
It's good to be OnePercentBetter today.
My name is Alex, and I'm gonna talk about porn.
It's often portrayed as a passive or positive habit.
But, do you know how it affects your brain?
Your brain is the most sophisticated mass of cells
on the planet and when you watch porn,
it releases a complex surge of chemicals
that burns the experience into your mind
and over time can lead to addiction.
Approximately 5% of all internet traffic is porn related
and for many college-age men
and women watching porn is a weekly or daily activity.
Your brain is small but hungry.
It consumes 20% of your oxygen
and blood circulation just to operate.
It has over one quadrillion synapses enabling
a complex system of cell-to-cell communication.
It's also adaptable, or plastic in its ability
to change at any age.
This organ of one billion neurons is always
making new connections.
The brain's grey matter can actually shrink or thicken.
Neural pathways or connections can be forged,
refined, weakened or cut depending on a range
of things like hormones, the environment or trauma.
Neurons that fire together start to wire together.
It's helpful to compare your thinking patterns
to tracks on a snow-covered mountain.
As you consistently move down the mountain
on the same track the path becomes easier
and smoother for next time.
Your brain responds in a very similar way to porn as to sex.
So, what actually happens inside your head?
Initially, your brain starts to release
a surge of dopamine which creates a state of tension,
focus and pleasure.
Norepinephrine is also released which makes you more alert
and burns the experience into your mind.
That's why these experiences can
become like a neurological tattoo.
They are difficult for you to forget or wipe away.
At the moment of climax oxytocin
and vasopressin are released.
These act like bonding agents.
They bond you to the person or object causing your arousal.
They are also released when a mother
touches a child or when couples touch.
These chemicals also start to cause out-group aggression.
This means that you will start to draw closer to the things
you are bonded to, porn,
and more distant from the things outside
the relationship, like your partner.
Opiates are released which create a sense of euphoria.
Serotonin is also released which creates
a feeling of calmness, wellbeing and satisfaction.
This is why some people use porn
to self-medicate their moods.
All of these chemicals train your brain not to bond
with another person but with porn.
As you consume more porn you get a build up
of DeltaFosB which is a molecular switch for addiction,
cravings and compulsions.
A study from Cambridge University found
that the addiction part of the brain lights up
on scans when people view porn.
People who watch porn start to become hyper-reactive
to sexual media.
Any hint of it immediately revs them up
and their threshold for pleasure raises.
A 2011 study found that the dopamine spikes
result in porn watchers needing increasingly
extreme experiences to become sexually aroused.
This often leads to users moving from comparatively
tame media to porn featuring more extreme content
like group sex, anal, bestiality, bondage or rape.
Research has shown that the following behaviours
become exhibited in individuals that continue to watch porn.
Normalising unhealthy behaviour.
Diminished sexual satisfaction when looking
at porn or engaging in sex.
Irritability, headaches, anxiety,
and depression when going without porn or sex.
Needing more sex, more risky sex,
or more graphic disturbing porn over a longer period of time
to get the same high.
They can even become unexcited by ordinary sex.
Invest in more time and effort to seek out sex.
Important social, occupational, or recreational activities
are sacrificed in order to engage in sex.
Essentially, porn starts to negatively affect many aspects
of your life in significant ways.
There are many ways to get help you and kick this habit.
Your brain is still an amazing mass of cells
that you can re-train.
Rather than walking down the same well used mountain path
you can develop a new path down the mountain.
To begin with it or feel unnatural,
like you are walking through waist deep snow,
however as you continue to make positive choices
the path becomes easier and more natural.
Essentially, you're re-train your brain
with thinking patterns.
So, is porn really a harmless habit?
Were you surprised how it can affects your brain?
If you enjoyed this check out my channel Lifelong Learners.
There's some great videos there about thinking,
technology, psychological experiments, and more.
Leave a comment below, and remember to subscribe
and give us a thumbs up.
And a special thanks to Brandon
and OnePercentBetter for collaborating with me on this.
Thanks for watching!