Are variations in gender equality evident in pornography? A cross-cultural study

In 1960, feminist groups and scholars published critiques of common “male-centric” views of sexuality. They analyzed pornography, traditions as to who initiates sexual encounters, the (non)existence of foreplay, and common (male dominant) sexual positions. Some even said such activities should be abolished (see Dworkin, 1985, Firestone, 1970 and Solanas, 1971). Today, the appropriate role of sexuality, specifically the role of pornography in women's lives, probably sparks the biggest debate among feminists. The majority of research on pornography focuses on its misogynistic biases and maladaptive effects, while the minority of literature contends that pornography can be egalitarian and thus be empowering for women. There is little research to test these competing hypotheses as to the value of pornography for women.This paper was designed to investigate whether or not in societies where men and women are relatively equal in status versus unequal, different kinds of pornography flourishes. Three countries that differed markedly in the status of women (based on their United Nation's Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM) ranking published in the 2007/2008 Human Development Report) were selected for comparison: Norway (1), the United States (15), and Japan (54). We then compared the nature of their most popular pornography.An analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to test the hypothesis that – consistent with their GEM ranking – popular Norwegian pornography would depict women in more empowered positions than pornography from the United States and Japan. Results supported this hypothesis. This finding could be attributed to the wider variety in Norwegian pornography, e.g. greater variation in the women's age, weight, and body positioning. There were no significant differences in the extent models in the three countries appeared in demeaning positions.

► As predicted, Norway's popular pornography depicted women in more empowering positions than did the United States’ or Japan's pornography.
► This difference in empowerment scores supports the minority literature that pornography does have the potential to depict women in empowering positions.
► Interestingly, there was not a significant difference in the amount of disempowering positions pornographic models were depicted in across the pornography of the three nations.
► The difference in empowerment scores, and lack of difference in disempowerment scores, indicates that people may potentially see both strength (empowerment) and weakness (disempowerment) as sexy.