He advertised for volunteers at the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation, a now-defunct medical organization that used to administer mandatory tests for
sexually transmitted infections to industry actors (tests are now done elsewhere).
Though the majority of porn stars would have used the Foundation's services, the volunteer sample makes it hard to know if the 177 actresses who agreed to participate in the study represent the industry as a whole. Nevertheless, the study is the largest sample of porn stars ever published.
The results of the research failed to support many common stereotypes. Most notably, the porn actresses were no more likely to report having been
sexually abused as children than national averages or than a sample of demographically matched women Griffith and his colleagues recruited at a university and at an airport.
Porn actresses did report having sex for the first time at a younger age and having more partners (outside of work) than the typical woman, which is unsurprising, Griffith said, given that they likely got into the adult industry because they liked sex. (Of the 177 women surveyed, only one said she was coerced into a pornography career.) Sixty-nine percent of porn actresses ranked their enjoyment of sex as 10 out of 10, a rating given by only 32.8 percent of non-performers. [
10 Surprising Sex Statistics]
Porn actresses were also more likely to report
higher self-esteem than average women, another unsurprising finding, Griffith said.
"They do have to be comfortable with themselves in order to engage in intercourse in front of other people on camera," he said.
Kross warned that the finding that porn actresses enjoyed sex more than other women might be unreliable, given that a porn star's public image relies on her fans' belief that she thinks sex is the "greatest thing on the planet." But the self-esteem finding did not surprise her.
"All you hear from fans is, 'Oh, you're so wonderful, I wish I had a girlfriend like you,'" she said. "The fan base just adores us. They worship us online, and we hear it every day."
The stereotype that porn stars use more drugs than the average person was partially true, Griffith and his colleagues found. Porn actresses had tried more drugs than other women, though the only difference in recent drug use was a higher prevalence of marijuana smoking. The
drug use could be linked to the personality of people who get into the industry, Griffith said.
"Maybe they're higher risk-takers," he said.
Kross agreed. "I have a feeling we've probably, as a demographic, tried skydiving more," she said. "We've probably tried monkey brains in South Africa more."
........but I am saying like other forms of media it has its good and bad.
