Samuel L. Perry (see RNS
2020) studied the relationship between Christians watching porn and marital
happiness. For people who do not attend church, the level of happiness is not
much different between those who watch or do not watch porn.
Marital Happiness
For those who attend church more than once a week, there is
a gap. Those who watch porn are less happy with their marriage than those who
did not watch porn. Perry did not note that the frequent church attenders who
watched porn were a bit happier than those who don’t go to church. He’s
charting predicted probabilities, but we don’t know the degree of error. Still,
the gap is somewhat interesting.
Sex Life Satisfaction.
In another chart, he illustrates the predicted level of sex
life satisfaction for two groups of people based on how often they visit an
adult website. For those who visit several times a day, there is a gap showing
much less satisfaction for those who attend church several times a week compared
to those who never attend.
So, what does it all mean?
Perry proposes a concept called "moral incongruence” and
offers the following opinion”
My frequent co-author, Bowling
Green State University psychology professor Joshua Grubbs, and I have
identified what we call “moral incongruence”: the experience of intentionally
violating one’s deeply held moral values. Moral incongruence results in depressive
symptoms and spiritual discouragement often due to shame and isolation. In
other words, whatever the negative effects of porn alone, they
are consistently far worse for those who seem to be violating their own moral
values in watching it. (emphasis added)
It is possible that there are negative effects of high porn
use among frequent church goers, but Perry has not demonstrated this to be true
in the article. Why? Simply because he has shown a correlation but did not show
that a cause-effect relationship exists. In later paragraphs he refers to “moral
incongruence effects.” In fairness, it seems reasonable that people who violate
the group’s social norms would experience a moral incongruence effect. However,
from a strictly scientific perspective, Perry needs to report experimental
evidence.
A Missing Variable
Correlational studies that show relationships can be helpful
because they encourage thinking about possible relationships between variables.
In the article, Perry did not discuss the possibility that Christians who are
not happy with their sex lives may look for other ways to enjoy sex. Thus, they
may turn to porn rather than obtain psychotherapy, commit adultery, or get a
divorce and find a new partner.
Is there a Practical Difference?
As you look at the predicted numbers in the graphs, there
isn’t much of a difference. For example, the gap between the porn and no porn
watchers who are “very happy” with their marriage and go to church a lot is
only .11 (.70 - .59 = .11). That .11 is not much on the graph so what does it look
like in terms of inner distress or the ability to work? Perry tells us about
other studies and the symptoms of distress. Perhaps there is a problem, but then
again, people can adapt to a way of life, rationalize what they are doing, and
cope in various ways with incongruities in life.
What are they watching?
There’s an intriguing finding in the next section. Some Christians
who never watch porn report being addicted to porn! One value of this finding
is a reminder that what one person considers porn another one does not. I am
reminded of an evangelical woman who declared “that’s porn” when walking by a
scantily clad model in a store’s display window. A friend told me that an evangelical
college did not allow textbooks in their human sexuality classes for years
because of the explicit images. Times have changed. And what is or is not porn must be defined by researchers.
Morality
One of my research interests has been in Moral FoundationsTheory. Conservative Christians can easily find that porn violates the
sexual purity foundation. Being pure in mind includes pure thoughts and sex has
long been a purity issue for evangelicals. However, progressive Christians and
non-Christians may share common cause with conservatives when porn includes
exploitation, abuse, and harm. Perry’s article encourages thinking so I
recommend it.
Read more about Christians Sexuality and Morality in
A House Divided: Sexuality, Morality, and Christian Cultures
Related research
Kelly, H.L., Sutton, G. W, Hicks, L., Godfrey,
A. & Gillihan, C. (2018). Factors predicting the moral appraisal of sexual
behavior in Christians. Journal of
Psychology and Christianity, 37,
(2), 162-177. Academia
Link ResearchGate
Link
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