Pornography has 'significant role' in sexual development of young Australians

Research from Queensland University of Technology and Our Watch surveyed Australians aged 15-20 and found 86 per cent of young men and 69 per cent of young women had seen pornographic material both intentionally and unintentionally.

The findings revealed 54.4 per cent of young men viewed pornography at least weekly compared with 14.3 per cent of young women.

Researcher on the study and project director of it's time we talked Maree Crabbe said pornography was many Australians' first sexual experience.

"On average young men see pornography three years before their first partnered sexual experience and young women see it two years before theirs," Ms Crabbe said.

"Many young men are watching pornography weekly or even daily and they're doing so for years before their first partner sexual experience.

"You can see the potential for porn to play a really significant role in sort of sexual development and the formation of sexual tastes and expectations."

With a large amount of pornographic material online being violent or demeaning towards women without their consent, Ms Crabbe said "for most young people, it's what they're seeing first".

"So when they become sexually active with another person they are often re-enacting what they've seen in pornography with some quite significant consequences," she said.

Founder of Teach Us Consent and author of Consent Laid Bare Chanel Contos was concerned about pornography becoming the default sex education for young Australians.

Ms Contos said sexual acts that were once considered part of the Bondage, Domination, Sadomasochism (BDSM) kink community, which has a strong emphasis on consent, were becoming more commonplace often without the same boundaries.

"The idea of normalised sexual violence as a result of [pornography] is to the point where people engaging in it don't even describe it as violence," Ms Contos said.

"Vanilla sex is now what is referred to as sex that does not include these acts."

Ms Contos has advocated for better sex education within Australia and said pornography should be part of those conversations.

"I think we need education and I think we need to create group debate," she said.

"So teaching porn literacy, teaching young people to be able to distinguish between fantasy and real life."

Ms Contos also said the consumption of pornography should be treated as a "public health issue".

"The same way that we have regulations around gambling and tobacco... we need that for pornography," Ms Contos said.