Professor Diana Russell has kindly permitted us to make this research paper available to the public as a free download. She co-authored it with Natalie Purcell. We made another work by Professor Russell, Against Pornography, available in an earlier post. This paper shows how child pornography and/or adult pornography can factor into pedophilia and child sexual abuse.
Download Here: Exposure to Pornography as a Cause of Child Sexual Victimization
(PDF; no obscene words or pictures, but some will find this material uncomfortable to read)
Here are excerpts from the paper:
We will argue in this chapter that a causal relationship exists between adult and juvenile males’ exposure to child pornography–including
computer-generated, written, and oral forms of pornography–and their perpetration of child sexual victimization…Because child pornography does not negatively affect all viewers to the same degree, some researchers conclude that mere exposure to this material cannot play a causal role in child sexual victimization. This is analogous to the tobacco industry’s faulty claim that, since many smokers do not die of lung cancer, smoking does not cause lung cancer. Such reasoning is faulty. When there are multiple causes for a phenomenon, any one of them
“may be a sufficient but not necessary condition for the occurrence of the effect or a necessary but not sufficient condition” (Theodorson & Theodorson, 1979, p. 40). In this sense of the term, we argue that exposure to child pornography causes child sexual victimization.Although women have been known to sexually abuse both male and female children, males form the overwhelming majority of child pornography consumers and perpetrators of child sexual victimization. Therefore, Russell’s three-factor causal theory focuses on male perpetrators…
Zillmann and Bryant…found that the subjects’ boredom after repeatedly viewing the same pornographic material motivated them to switch to viewing different and more extreme pornography, such as material involving the infliction of pain, violent pornography, and “uncommon or unusual sexual practices,” including bondage, sadomasochism and bestiality (Zillmann & Bryant, 1986, p. 577)…
Although masturbation is not addressed in the experiments of Howard et al. and Zillmann and Bryant, this is a major goal of pornography. The ejaculatory pleasure obtained from masturbation intensifies the
association between it and the pornography viewed, a theory confirmed by considerable experimental research (Cline, 1974; Osanka & Johann, 1989). Most males consider masturbation a very inferior alternative to sex
with the type of individuals they desire. Thus, viewers may desire to act out the sexual acts depicted in pornography. For this reason and others, researchers have concluded that catharsis theory is clearly not substantiated (Sommers & Check, 1987).Research aside, common sense and rationality unequivocally challenge the catharsis theory. Very few people would likely support a proposal to solve the problem of parents physically beating their children by having
them watch movies that show parents battering and torturing their children. Why is it only in the case of misogynistic pornography
that so many individuals–including a handful of researchers–believe that exposure dissipates the problem? The plain inconsistency and irrationality of the catharsis theory suffice to dismiss the notion that pornography
serves as a “safety valve…”Referring to the sizable legal market in pseudo-child pornography in which adult women masquerade as young teens on adult sites titled “lolitas” or “child porn,” Jenkins (2001, p. 29) infers that “the popularity of such materials indicates a mass popular market for teen sexuality” in the United States (p. 28). Jenkins is struck by pornography merchants’ assumption “that a substantial audience would be interested in something
that notionally lies so far beyond the pale” (p. 30). From these observations he infers “that those interested in child pornography might not be so far removed from the ‘normal’ population” (p. 30)…The following five quantitative findings of different researchers serve as summary indicators of males’ proclivity to sexually victimize children in the United States as of this writing…
- 10–15% of males report some likelihood of sexually abusing a child if assured that they would not be caught (N. Malamuth, personal communication, July 1986).
- 21% of male undergraduates admitted to some sexual attraction to small children (Briere & Runtz, 1989).
- Adult males’ sexual attraction to female adolescents is very prevalent and considered “normal” for heterosexual males (Dietz &
Sears, 1987–1988; Jenkins, 2001).- “Children [preadolescent girls] have some arousal value even for normal males” (Freund, 1981, p. 137).
- 38% of adult women disclosed being victims of child sexual abuse involving contact/ attempted contact; 54% involving non-contact (Russell, 1999)…
Child pornography transforms children into sexual objects designed to appeal to pedophiles and non-pedophilic child molesters. One pornographer declared that “Girls, say between the ages of 8 and 13, are the very salable objects…young girls without overdevelopment and preferably with little or no pubic hair on their body” (Campagna & Poffenberger, 1988, p. 133) (emphasis added). Similarly, researchers Campagna and Poffenberger maintain that child pornography is “a medium by which the victim is reduced to an object or animal state” (p. 138) (emphasis added).
Child pornographers often direct the girls they photograph to get into sexual poses or to engage in masturbation or sexual intercourse like women in adult pornography. These sexualized pictures of girls (often acting
as mini-adults) evoke a sexual response in some males who previously had no interest in sex with girls.O’Connell (2001) notes that “the easy accessibility and transnational distribution of child pornography” sexualizes children for a rapidly growing audience (p. 65). Hence, increasing numbers of males all over the world are developing a sexual interest in children for the first time…
Pseudo-child pornography portrays adult women as if they were young girls–not in the sexual acts they perform, but in the props used and the captions or text accompanying the pictures. The “childification” of women
in pseudo-child pornography is accomplished by dressing them in childish clothes, giving them childish hairstyles, having them stand in childlike poses with childlike expressions on their faces, or surrounding them with
children’s toys. A prevalent form of pornography, childification is also becoming increasingly mainstream (e.g., pop star Britney Spears dressing like a young school girl and dancing seductively in the popular video,
“Hit Me Baby One More Time,” and the sale of school girl uniforms as lingerie by companies like Emporio Lingerie, Linay Lingerie, and Lollipop Lingerie). Masturbation to pseudo-child pornography can serve as a bridge between adult pornography and child pornography. The transition of a male’s arousal to child pornography can be achieved through a step-by-step process of exposure to gradually younger sexualized teenagers and eventually prepubescent girls.Adultification also merges sexual images of girls and women. This process entails depicting girls as mini-adults with the use of makeup, seductive clothes, sexy adult-like poses, and/or accompanying text (e.g., pictures
of 12-year-old Brooke Shields who was named the most beautiful woman in the world). Such adultified images are prevalent in advertisements published in the non-pornographic media and in pornography. Like pseudo-child pornography, adultified child images can sexualize girls for some male viewers who never before felt sexual interest in young girls.Earlier we discussed Freund’s (1981) experiment in which he found that a significant percentage of male subjects became sexually aroused by non-sexualized pictures of nude preadolescent girls. For this reason, it
seems virtually certain that exposure to child pornography would stimulate even more sexual arousal in “normal” males…A classic experiment by Rachman and Hodgson (1968) demonstrates that male subjects can learn to become sexually aroused by seeing a picture of a woman’s boot after repeatedly seeing women’s boots in association with sexually arousing slides of nude females. The laws of learning that created the boot fetish can also presumably teach males who previously were not sexually aroused by depictions of adult–child sex, to become
aroused after exposure to child pornography.Masturbation to child pornography during or following exposure to it, reinforces the association between these images and sexual gratification.
This constitutes what McGuire, Carlisle, and Young (1965) refer to as
“masturbatory conditioning” (p. 185). These researchers hypothesized that “an individual’s arousal pattern can be altered by directly changing his masturbatory fantasies” (Abel, Blanchard, & Becker, 1978, p. 192). Abel et al. (1978) have treated violent sexual perpetrators by conditioning them to masturbate and ejaculate to nonviolent consensual portrayals of sex.
Presumably, it is equally possible to change males’ non-deviant sexual fantasies and behavior to deviant ones. Hence, when male Internet users with no previous sexual interest in children inadvertently find themselves
looking at child pornography, or when curiosity prompts such males to deliberately search out child pornography, they may be surprised to find themselves aroused by sexualized pictures of children. If these male
viewers masturbate while viewing sexual pictures of children, this presumably can be the beginning of a growing interest in sex with children. For example, Jenkins (2001) notes that some posts on the Web “suggest that individuals were ‘converted’ after discovering the material [child pornography]” (p. 106) (emphasis added).Furthermore, repeated masturbation to these portrayals may result in increased arousal. The pleasurable experience of orgasm is an exceptionally potent reinforcer. Adult and child pornography are widely used by males as ejaculation material and thus are effective at constructing or reconstructing viewers’ patterns of sexual arousal and expression…
It seems reasonable to suppose that some of the males who become bored with ordinary adult pornography would opt to view child pornography since it qualifies as a “less commonly practiced sexual activity.” Margaret Healy (2002) supports our conjecture:
With the emergence of the use of computers to traffic in child pornography, a new and growing segment of producers and consumers is being identified. They are individuals who may not have a sexual preference
for children, but who have seen the gamut of adult pornography and who are
searching for more bizarre material… (p. 4)Many males with a sexual interest in children deliberately use child pornography to intensify their sexual desire as a prelude to masturbation or the sexual abuse of children. Silbert and Pines (1993) report that a father in their study used to show “his friends pornographic movies to
get them sexually aroused before they would rape” his 9-year-old daughter (p. 117–118)…[T]he more pedophiles and child molesters masturbate to child pornography,
the stronger their arousal to this material, and the more it reinforces the association between their fantasies and their desire to have sex
with or sexually abuse children…With regard to incestuous abuse, every conceivable relationship is portrayed in pictorial and written forms on the Internet–especially fathers having sex with their daughters. Rare forms of incestuous abuse are greatly overrepresented, including mother–son incest and female-on-female incestuous abuse. Many of the acts demonstrated or described in Internet pornography are portrayed as exciting and unconventional, providing viewers with new ideas for having sex with children. For example, Jenkins (2001) quotes a pedophile who was seeking “hardcore lolita pictures” and requesting pictures in a “Mom & Son
Series” (p. 85). A colleague responded, “Yeah! He’s right! That would be the best post of the last 2 months! Come on! Everyone with mom&son Pics! PLZ Post!” (p. 85).Child pornography provides models for males who already have a sexual interest in children. By seeing the different acts perpetrated on children (many of which elicit no negative responses and some of which appear
to elicit positive responses or enjoyment), these “newbies” (a term used by many pedophiles) are provided with models that can shape and intensify their desires. Portrayals of child pornography showing only positive consequences for the perpetrators and the victims are particularly conducive to imitation. (However, for males who are sadistic, child pornography showing negative consequences for the victim is more
likely to intensify sexual arousal and serve as a model to imitate…)Tim Tate (1990) provides another example, quoting Len, a pedophile who had
molested several hundred young boys during his lifetime:Child pornography became important to me because I enjoyed it, fantasized and masturbated to it. It wasn’t a safety valve, though. At the time I was looking at the magazine it was OK, I was fine..but you’re not going
to look at a magazine all day. So when I went out in the open I would see another pretty boy and find myself chatting him up. In the end I would put into practice what I had seen in the magazines… (p. 110)Jenkins (2001) maintains that some viewers of child pornography become addicted, with an increasing “hunger for ever more illegal material” (p. 109). Newcomers to child pornography on the Internet may be “amazed and stimulated by the first few softcore pornographic images” they see (p. 109). However, these images “are all too likely to become routine,” motivating the more frequent downloaders to turn “avidly to the
harder-core sites” (p. 109).Tim Tate (1990) interviewed a pedophile who described how child pornography created his desire for increasingly more extreme forms of child pornography:
I know that my own response to erotica [sic], and that of a number of paedophile acquaintances, is indeed subject to the “law of diminishing kicks.” Whereas at one time, when they first became available to me, pictures of [merely] nude boys were a powerful stimulus to masturbation, the response gradually wore off; after this only stronger pictures, showing boys engaged in masturbation or fellatio with other boys, were
capable of reproducing a comparably powerful masturbation stimulus to that which I had felt on my first exposure to nudes… Even the response to these stronger pictures diminished slightly with familiarity, but another new stimulus…pictures showing anal intercourse with boys…revived the
response. (p. 177)Habituation is clearly an intrinsic feature in the escalation described by viewers of child pornography. Some child pornography users acknowledge that “involvement thus becomes a cumulative process” (Jenkins, 2001, p. 109). For example, one pedophile explained, “With this hobby we get bored
after a while with the usual and we risk a bit to get new stuff or get actual experience. It’s a natural progression” (p. 109) (emphasis added). Wyre reports that his “Clients–abusers–have told me of their experience of child pornography which started out as pictures of mutual masturbation and ended with them watching videos of rape, torture and [the] death of a child” (Wyre, as quoted in Tate, 1990, p. 167).In addition, researchers Max Taylor and Ethel Quayle (2003) interviewed 13 men in Ireland who were convicted of downloading child pornography from the Internet. Quayle and Taylor reported that, “The majority of respondents moved through a variety of pornographies, each time accessing more extreme material. The extremity might manifest in the age of the children in the photographs or to the sexual activities being
portrayed” (p. 84)…Rather than child pornography showing child victims with smiling faces, some of these seasoned viewers gravitate to more callous and sadistic images showing children being upset, traumatized, or even killed. For
example, a Web site called russian___.com tries to entice sadistic viewers to “see the poor young girls swallow what they don’t want, but have to do…see the horror in the eyes of the young girls and see them wild
scream [sic] in brutally [sic] rape and pain!” Another Web site called ___asians.com promises “the very best collection of very young Asian girls brutally raped…”The prevalence of child pornography sites, their content, and their positive portrayals of adult–child sexual abuse all serve to diminish
the deviant nature of incestuous and extrafamilial child sexual abuse. This in turn enhances the likelihood that some men’s internal inhibitions against acting out incestuous and extrafamilial child sexual victimization
will be undermined.It is also important to note two other ways in which the prohibition against adult–child sex is undermined by child pornography. First, the inclusion of many child pornography cartoons in mainstream men’s magazines
like Playboy and Penthouse communicates its social acceptability. Second, the boards on various sites allow visitors to form their own subcultural communities in which such behaviors or desires are not considered
deviant and where pedophiles and others interested in child pornography can feel more normal…Masking child victims’ pain and trauma is a major way in which the prohibition against child sexual abuse is undermined. A pedophile called Stewart describes how he masked victims’ pain when he photographed young girls:
They couldn’t show fear or doubt in the pictures. They had to show happiness or love… To get that look, I’d give them something, from tricycles to stereos. It depended on what they wanted. You have to be able to express [evoke] excitement in the pictures… (Campagna & Poffenberger, 1988, p. 126)
Joseph LoPiccolo (1994) emphasizes that “most sex offenders have a variety of distorted cognitive beliefs that are intimately related to their deviant behavior” (LoPiccolo, personal communication, September 16, 2005. See LoPiccolo, 1994, for examples of these distorted cognitive beliefs). These “false belief-systems” (Itzin, 1996, p. 170) or myths can be created and reinforced when males view child pornography. For example, child pornography can convince males who sexually desire children “that the feelings and desires they have towards children are not wrong” (Tate,
1990, p. 110).Following are nine other examples of distorted cognitions or myths commonly held by pedophiles:
- There’s nothing wrong with adult–child sex as long as children consent to it.
- If children behave seductively toward adults, it means “they’re asking for it.”
- Men who love children have sex with them to teach them about sex in a positive, caring, emotional context.
- Having sex with kids is good sex education for them, to prevent them from having sexual problems as adults.
- Since children are sexual beings with the capacity to enjoy sexual stimulation, it’s fine for an adult to provide them with this enjoyment.
- Children who don’t tell anyone about being molested, can’t be upset or bothered about it.
- If children didn’t want to have sex with adults, they would react by crying, fighting, screaming, and resisting.
- When children initiate sex with adults or allow themselves to be repeatedly molested by adults, it shows that they enjoy having sex with them.
- Sex between adult males and children is harmless unless force is involved.
Belief in these myths undermines internal inhibitions against acting out the desire to sexually abuse children. For example, Jenkins (2001) notes that many pedophiles justify their sexual behavior with children by
claiming that children “consented to the actions,” or directly sought sexual contact with their perpetrators (p. 117). These pedophiles consider such experiences to be “consensual. Even if the child is three or five, she was still asking for it” (Jenkins, 2001, p. 117). Jenkins also maintains that “[l]inked to this is the denial of injury, since
the sexual activity is seen as rewarding and even educational for the child, rather than selfish or exploitative” (p.117). As Kelly, Wingfield, and Regan (1995) observe, child pornography “enables them [perpetrators]
to construct a different version of reality” (p. 34) in which it is possible for them to believe “that both their sexual and non-sexual
needs are being met without hurting the child” (Wyre, 1990, pp. 284–285)…Linz and Imrich (2001) maintain that “child pornography can desensitize viewers to the pathology of sexual abuse or exploitation of children, so that it can become acceptable to…the viewer” (p. 87). Congress made the same point when they passed the Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1996
banning computer-generated child pornography (Taylor, 2001, p. 51)…Playboy, Hustler magazines all “covertly” normalize adult–child sex and promote sex with children (Mayne, 2000, p. 25). There are many examples–particularly of cartoons in Hustler–that quite blatantly
legitimatize incestuous and extrafamilial child sexual abuse. Many of them trivialize child sexual victimization by repeatedly making jokes about this crime…Some males who have never acted on their desire to have sex with a child may be ignorant or anxious about how to proceed with this. Such concerns can inhibit them from perpetrating such an act. Child pornography removes this impediment by providing instructions for the sexual abuse of children. Tyler, a detective sergeant in the San Bernardino, California, Sheriff’s Department, testified in hearings on child pornography
and pedophilia conducted by Senator Arlen Specter about a child pornography magazine that described “how to have sex with prepubescent children” (Child Pornography and Pedophilia, 1984, p. 33). During these hearings, Senator Specter also discussed a book titled How to Have Sex With Kids that described “how to meet children, how to entice them, how to develop a relationship with them, and how to have sex with them”(p. 30). Sexually explicit illegal material presumably demonstrates at what ages it is possible for adult males to penetrate young children anally and vaginally. Similarly, Gail Dines, Robert Jensen, and Ann Russo (1998) analyzed a scene in the best-selling pseudochild
pornography video titled Cherry Poppers Vol. 10 that included “realistic
detailed instructions on how to initiate a child into sex” (p. 88). Dines, Jensen, and Russo considered it to be “a manual for how to perpetrate
a sexual assault on a child” (p. 88)…We have not seen any pictorial child pornography that shows a sexual predator being apprehended by the police or ending up in prison…
Exposure to large amounts of child pornography undermines viewers’ fear of legal sanctions, public shame, and ostracism…
Frequent exposure to child pornography on the Internet promotes the perception that many child pornography producers are “getting away with it” and profiting from it. The desire to benefit financially from the immense economic opportunities available to child pornographers on the Internet could undermine the social inhibitions of some male viewers with a sexual desire for children. The stronger their need or motivation to make money, the more this motivation is likely to overwhelm their social inhibitions…
Showing pornography to boys and girls is a common seduction strategy of pedophiles who hope thereby to arouse children’s sexual curiosity or sexual desire…
Pedophiles posing as young teenagers in Internet teen chat groups often send pornographic pictures or e-mail messages containing pornographic language to children. These predators use pornographic pictures to arouse the children’s curiosity or sexual interest and manipulate them into
meeting. These meetings typically culminate in the sexual victimization of the child or children…[W]e conclude that exposure to child or adult pornography can arouse children’s sexual curiosity or desire and thereby undermine their abilities to avoid, resist, or escape being sexually abused…
Showing [children] a picture “legitimizes the abuser’s requests” (p. 119).
In the following example, an incestuous father’s attempts to use pornography to normalize and legitimize having sex with his daughter were unusually persistent.
The incest started at the age of eight. I did not understand any of it and did not feel that it was right. My dad would try to convince me that it was ok. He would find magazines, articles or pictures that would show fathers and daughters or mothers, brothers and sisters having sexual intercourse. (Mostly fathers and daughters.) He would say that if it was published in magazines that it had to be all right because magazines
could not publish lies… He would say, “See it’s okay to do because
it’s published in magazines.” (Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography: Final Report, Vol. 1, 1986, p. 786)Child molesters also send pornography to the children they have targeted for sexual victimization to convince them “that other children are sexually active” (Hughes, 1999, p. 28). Showing children child
pornography thus normalizes and legitimatizes adult–child sexual encounters in the minds of some children…When child molesters expose targeted children to pornography, the children often feel guilty and complicit, particularly if they found the material sexually exciting or masturbated to it. According to Scotland Yard, one of the five major ways that pedophiles use pornography is to “ensure the secrecy of any sexual activity with a child who has already been seduced” (Tate, 1990, p. 24). Child molesters can often silence their victims by
telling them that their parents would be very upset to learn that they had watched pornography. Even without such warnings, children often fear that their parents will blame and punish them for having looked at this material. Children who are sexually abused following the exposure may feel complicit in the abuse and thus become even more motivated to remain silent. Ultimately, this reduces the likelihood that abused children will disclose the sexual abuse to their parents or others.
Download the complete paper here (PDF):
Exposure to Pornography as a Cause of Child Sexual Victimization
Read further in this subject in our Child Molestation and Child Porn categories.