Making contraception less available to teens tends to backfire, says Marty Klein, author of America's War on Sex. Teens that receive an abstinence-only sex education have the same amount of sex that other teens are having, except they don't use protection as often. Where abstinence-only sex education fails to impact sexual behavior, it still shapes how teens perceive their actions. Young people that get less sex education understand less about sex and their bodies, have lower self-worth and are less open to talking about their sexual feelings and experiences with an adult.41 It has been shown that when young people are given a comprehensive education about sex they have less sexual partners than those who didn't receive sex education. Rather, sex education programs help delay the onset of sexual behavior, and when those young people do begin having sex they use condoms more often, have fewer unplanned pregnancies, and contract fewer STIs.42
In the US fifteen- to twenty-four-year-olds made up about 25 percent of the sexually active population, yet they acquired nearly half of all new STIs.43 In 2012 there were 29.4 births per 1,000 women aged fifteen to nineteen—a higher teen birth rate than in almost every other developed country.44 An estimated 84 percent of women who had abortions in 2008 were unmarried.45 Despite the overall trend of declining teen births, approximately five out of six teen mothers in the US are unmarried, whereas just one out of six teen mothers in 1960 were unmarried.46
Teen childbearing cost the US about $3 billion in public expenditures and $6 billion in lost tax revenue each year, says the CDC.47 The direct medical costs of STIs among fifteen- to twenty-four-year-olds are estimated to cost another $6.5 billion annually.48 Yet the grand total for funding all abstinence education, pregnancy/STI/HIV prevention and education programs, and family planning services annually is only $874 million.49 If it's not already obvious, these numbers on their own clearly indicate that it is worth it to make these programs more effective.
Students want better programs, too, but unfortunately they have little influence on what information schools give them. With few public resources and no help from parents, the Internet has become the main go-to resource for unanswered questions and curiosities. Porn, being as accessible as it is, is now serving as both sexual educator and safe haven for emerging sexual needs.
One complicating factor in all this is the insidious intrusion of time perspective personalities in sexual decision-making, in particular the present-hedonistic orientation that typifies many teenagers. For most adults, there is a balance between being in the moment and being future-oriented, which involves setting long-term goals and making plans, along with integrating a sense of the past. Those who are present-hedonists predominantly seek continual stimulation, novelty, and pleasure, and avoid anything that is repetitive that will soon become boring.
In a classic research demonstration conducted by Walter Mischel at Stanford University many years ago, nursery age children won the prize of a marshmallow after winning a game. The experimenter gave them the option of eating the marshmallow immediately or, if they were able to wait with the one marshmallow and resist temptation while the experimenter stepped out of the room, would be rewarded with an additional marshmallow when he returned. All of the children wanted two marshmallows, but only some waited. That simple test turns out to be a test of willpower and mastery. When experimenters checked in with the children years later, there were amazing differences between those who waited and those who didn't: the ones who were able to delay gratification were much more successful academically, socially, and later in their work and family life. Mischel published his findings in the 2014 book, The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self-Control.
We would argue that the kids who were the resisters were more future-oriented, realizing that two marshmallows in a while is a better deal than one on the table to be devoured now. The others who could not resist the temptation before them were living in a narrow present-hedonistic time zone, with the future out of sight and out of mind! We would bet that is the dominant mentality of young and even older compulsive gamers as well as porn users. In fact, recent research suggests the sexual rewards of online porn contribute to a lowered general ability to delay gratification, as users' preference for smaller and sooner rewards as opposed to larger and later rewards was somewhat mitigated after abstaining from porn for several weeks.50
Many teens act on impulse without concern for future consequences—they leap before looking. And they are curious, which is only natural. Young people are going to learn about sex one way or another, and technology is here to stay, which raises the question to parents: would you like to educate your children about sex—or would you rather let the industries, like porn and other popular media, which exploit your failure to do so, be their primary source of education? “Don't do it,” or “be safe,” isn't an education. Although condoms tend to break less than vows of abstinence, kids need more grown-ups they can talk with and readily accessible resources they can go to for issues and questions. Parents must begin sensitive conversations about sex with their children not later than ten or eleven years old.
TEN
Environmental Changes
Are young men less fertile than their fathers and grandfathers were? New research is suggesting that this is the case. In the US, male sperm count is estimated to be going down 1.5 percent every year.1 Richard Sharpe, a male reproductive health specialist at the University of Edinburgh, found from a series of synchronized studies that one in five young men in northern Europe has a sperm count low enough to negatively affect his fertility. Why such a dramatic change in a short time frame? Sharpe's observations, highlighted by the Wall Street Journal, were discussed along with other research from Australia that found low sperm count to be correlated with the men's own marijuana use, maternal smoking during pregnancy, having a low birth weight, and being overweight or underweight in childhood.2 Certain lifestyle choices such as alcohol and tobacco use, illegal drug use (including anabolic steroids and cocaine), stress, obesity, and prolonged use of computers or video display monitors, can also contribute to these newly discovered lower sperm counts.3
These factors are all-important, but are only a piece of the puzzle we are trying to solve. There are other elements at play that are beyond individual control. In recent years much attention has been given to pervasive and damaging hormone-altering chemicals in our living environments, such as endocrine disruptors.
The endocrine system, also known as the hormone system, regulates all biological processes in the body from conception to death, including the development of the brain and nervous system, growth and functioning of the reproductive system, and regulation of the metabolism and blood sugar levels. It is made up of glands (mainly the female ovaries, male testes, and pituitary, thyroid and adrenal glands), hormones that are produced and released by the glands into the bloodstream, and receptors on organs and tissues around the body that recognize and react to the hormones. The hormones act as chemical messengers that bind to compatible receptors, and once attached those receptors carry out the hormone's instructions. Some endocrine disruptors mimic natural hormones, which fool the body into over-producing or under-producing certain hormones (such as growth hormones, estrogen, androgen, insulin, or thyroid), and in doing so throws off the body's natural balance.4
According to the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), endocrine disruptors are chemicals found in a variety of natural and man-made products such as pharmaceuticals, food, metal food cans, plastic beverage bottles, detergents, cosmetics, toys, pesticides, and flame retardants—in the form of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs)—that are often found in older furniture, carpets, car seats, and mattresses. These products may contain dioxin and dioxin-like compounds, polychlorinated biphenyls, DDT, and other pesticides, or plasticizers like phthalates and bisphenol A (BPA), which, at levels yet to be determined, interfere with the body's endocrine system and have detrimental immune, reproductive, developmental, and neurological effects in all animals, including humans.5
> As far back as 1950, researchers noted that the pesticide DDT could hinder the sexual development of roosters, leading to “chemical castration,” and other reproductive peculiarities, say Theo Colborn, Dianne Dumanoski, and John Myers, authors of Our Stolen Future. Since then, more and more incidences popped up around North America and Europe; birds, otters, alligators, and fish had undergone noticeable hormonal and reproductive abnormalities because of exposure to PCBs— chemicals that are used to insulate electrical equipment—and other synthetic compounds.6
In a 2002 article for New Scientist, Julie Wakefield described how in the 1980s Mike Howell, a fish biologist at Samford University in Alabama, observed female mosquitofish in Florida rivers developing the same kind of enlarged anal fins that their male counterparts used in mating. Investigating further, he found the fish were downstream from a paper mill. A year before Wakefield's article, Howell and his team analyzed samples taken downstream in the polluted water of another paper mill. They found traces of androgens, particularly androstenedione, which is a precursor to testosterone and an anabolic steroid popular with body-builders. In this particular instance, sterols in the wood pulp that were churned out by the mill had reacted with bacteria in the water, causing the presence of androstenedione, making Howell's team wonder if similar biological processes were releasing more androgens into the environment. Wakefield went further, saying that we shouldn't be concerned about just androgens, but anti-androgens too, which are chemicals that prevent the usual activity of male hormones in the body. Anti-androgens are capable of halting the testosterone production, blocking its ability to communicate with cells that turn on key genes, or even tampering with the activity of genes testosterone usually turns on. “This is worrying,” says Wakefield, “because testosterone is vital for the normal development of the male sex organs.”7
The biggest unknown is the cumulative effect of endocrine disruptors. Michael Skinner, who runs a research laboratory at Washington State University, shed some light on how biological instructions are transferred to subsequent generations when he conducted an experiment with pregnant rats in 2005. The experiment was supposed to test whether exposing them to a fungicide would affect the sex of the unborn fetus, and although he and his colleagues found lower sperm counts and decreased fertility in the male offspring, there was no effect on sexual differentiation.
Afterward, one of the research fellows mistakenly bred the grandchildren of those exposed rats, creating a fourth generation from the original rats. Skinner told her she might as well analyze them, too. The results were astonishing. The third generation of males born after the pregnant female had been exposed to the fungicide had low sperm counts like their grandfathers, but the researchers also discovered that the initial exposure of the pregnant rat—the great-grandmother—to the toxins would change the pattern of molecules known as methyl groups that fasten onto the DNA in the fetus's germ-line cells, which would eventually become that rat's sperm or eggs. Like “burrs stuck to a knit sweater,” these methyl molecules disrupted the functioning of the DNA and were carried down to future generations, opening them up to disease. Skinner hypothesized that in the future, medical diagnostics could involve having methylation patterns screened, as that might indicate prior generations' exposure to chemicals that are impacting the well-being of the current patient. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) criticized his study as having no relevancy for the risk assessment on a certain chemical because of the exaggerated doses of the chemicals, but it is provocative work nonetheless. No doubt further research will help unravel the mysteries of such genetic inheritance.8
To sum up, the potential short- and long-term effects of these persistent, possibly bio-accumulative and toxic chemicals being put out into our environments need further study by independent research groups. Understandably, the inconclusive results of many studies combined with the rising rates of chronic and fatal illnesses have made people uneasy. Around the world, for example, testicular cancer rates are twice what they were in the 1960s,9 and cases of hypospadias, a birth defect where the penis doesn't develop normally and the urethral opening appears in an irregular position on the shaft, have also increased.
In Denmark, testicular cancer rates tripled between the 1940s and 1980s.10 Danish researcher Niels Skakkebaek has found multiple reproductive problems such as testicular cancer, abnormally formed genitals, and low sperm counts all rising simultaneously. He and his team believed unusual development of the testes was the cause, referring to the condition as testicular dysgenesis syndrome (TDS), a process that Skakkebaek believes can be affected in the womb. If hormone disruptors inhibited the natural process of the cells that developed into sperm, he said, it could predispose a person to infertility and cancer later in life.11 Research has shown pregnant women and their newborn babies are most sensitive to the effects of these chemicals, because that is when a child's organ and neural systems are initially forming.12
According to Mehran Alaee, a research scientist at Environment Canada, North American PBDE levels double every two to five years; the level of PBDEs present in the breast milk of American and Canadian women is forty times higher than in the breast milk of Swedish women, where there is greater governmental concern over endocrine disruptors.13 Bruce Lanphear and researchers from Simon Fraser University found that infants of women exposed to high levels of PBDEs in early pregnancy suffered drops in IQ comparable to the detrimental effects of lead exposure in the environment.14
The current obesity pandemic contributes to these problems, as the more body fat a person has, the greater the potential is for toxins to be stored. Wakefield said the majority of these compounds aren't excreted by the body, but instead build up inside body fat tissues. The real problems, however, arise when body fat breaks down, because the accumulated toxins are then released into the bloodstream. “No one understands how the chemicals in this cocktail might interact with one another to increase or reduce the overall effect on our health,” she says.15 This should be a huge wake-up call to both consumers, who have the purchasing power, and the health authorities, whose duty it is to protect their citizens.
ELEVEN
Technology Enchantment and Arousal Addiction
Technology challenges us to assert our human values, which means that, first of all, we have to figure out what they are. That's not so easy. Technology isn't good or bad, it's powerful and it's complicated. Take advantage of what it can do. Learn what it can do. But also ask, “What is it doing to us?” We're going to slowly, slowly find our balance, but I think it's going to take time.
—Sherry Turkle1
Enchantment,” was the word The Lord of Rings author J.R.R. Tolkien used to define human beings' total immersion in a secondary world. He said that the more “you think that you are . . . bodily inside [a] Secondary World [the more] the experience may be very similar to Dreaming . . . but . . . you are in a dream that some other mind is weaving, and the knowledge of that alarming fact may slip from your grasp.”2 Tolkien was recognizing the ability to get lost in tales and stories. When you consider how much easier it is to get caught up in a virtual world where the story is told through visual stimuli than a story that was previously only written in text or spoken in words, Tolkien's revelation is alarming indeed.
The structure of language and slowness of reading text makes it more difficult to get wrapped up the same way one can in the implicit and visceral virtual world of online games. There is no reward system in books, for example, except for the ultimate satisfaction of having solved a puzzle presented, or having understood the meaning of a message in a parable. Unlike video games there is no exclusivity, status, or reward associated with page progression, and unlike porn there is no orgasm at the end—with the exception of erotic novels and books such as Fifty Shades of Grey, where perhaps there is some convergence.
When we immerse ourselves in a stimulating visual environment where a lot of information is demanding our immediate attention, the cognitive load overburdens our working memo
ry, and not a whole lot is going into our long-term memory. Having a high cognitive load amplifies distractedness, and makes it more difficult for the mind to distinguish between relevant and irrelevant data. The mind gets bogged down by constant pop-ups, ads, and hyperlinks, devoting more brain power to evaluating whether to click on them or not, and less attention is given to understanding whether the content is relevant or not. Watching porn can also interfere with men's working memory—especially when their level of arousal (and need to masturbate) is greater3—which could explain why so many of them miss class or forget to go to appointments after extended porn immersion.
Books and movies may be able to transport the reader's mind to another world but they don't offer the same satisfaction or feeling of achievement that a person can experience in the roles they play in gamified‡ virtual worlds. In porn, young men get to have a taste of what it's like to be a sheikh with their own virtual harem, and in video games they get to experience being the hero and the antihero without the conditions or permanence of real life, and without risking life or limb. Therefore, it's no wonder that many young men consider the thrill-packed worlds of online porn and video games far more exciting than anything they encounter on a daily basis in their real lives.
Video games offer virtual rewards at regular intervals, often after a certain level has been reached or a specific skill has been mastered. This schedule of reinforcement fits in perfectly with the kind of operant conditioning used by psychologist B.F. Skinner in the 1940s to motivate pigeons to press a lever endlessly for extra food in his specially designed “Skinner Box.” Behavior that is positively reinforced tends to be repeated, especially if it comes at variable ratios, and in video games, after the required amount of effort and skill has been made, the reward is guaranteed.
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