Young women and pornography : A qualitative study on young women's ambivalent attitudes towards pornography and how it should be understood and explained

This study aims to answer the question: How can young women’s ambivalent attitudes and actions to pornography be understood and explained from a gender perspective? From earlier studies it is shown that women have opinions on pornography that does not match their action. To understand why they have these ambivalent attitudes interviews with eight different young women have been held. The women have been in the ages from 20 to 30 years old. They have had to answer questions about their pornography use and their experiences around pornography. Theories that have been used to understand their behaviors and attitudes have been Connell’s and Pearse’s (2015) theory about gender, Gagnon’s and Simon’s (2005) theory about sexual script and lastly Goffman’s (2011) theory about stigmatization. The result of the study has shown that the women’s ambivalent attitudes can be understood by what’s expected from them. Society has expectation on both boys and girls. To fit in in society’s picture of how a girl should be these women have decided to follow these expectations or else they would be seen as less “feminine”. It also could be understood that they don’t understand why they follow these expectations but could be explained by what they are taught and by norms.