5 Things Every Parent Needs to Hear About Porn

Odds are, your parents probably didn’t have the porn talk with you when you were growing up. It was still consumed — some things dont change across generations — but it was much harder to get. You had to physically have access to a magazine or video tape. 

Today, kids are given smartphones at younger and younger ages, and these devices have instant access to porn in countless different ways. And while sexual curiosity is completely normal, porn can be dangerous because of how it depicts sex and how it affects growing young minds. 

5 Things Every Parent Needs to Hear About Porn

1. The average age kids view porn for the first time is much younger than you may realize

12 is the most common age kids view porn for the first time, according to this Common Sense Media report. But for another chunk of young people (15%) the first time can be 10 or younger — some as young as 6. This goes to show that porn is absolutely rampant on the internet, and that no child is immune from encountering it.

2. They will encounter it eventually — even if you block it on their phone and at home, and even if they’re not looking for it

Will some kids go looking for porn? Yes, which is why blocking it at home through parental control apps is so important. But kids may also unintentionally encounter it through pop-up ads or innocently googling a phrase that may reveal inappropriate content. But perhaps even harder to acknowledge is that other kids are a driving factor in viewing porn — on the bus, after school, at sleepovers. 

3. Girls are also watching porn

Many adults may think that porn is purely a problem with young men, and that couldn’t be further from the truth. 57% of girls aged 14–18 have watched porn. Common reasons include curiosity, pressure to conform, and accidental discovery.

4. Some kids are addicted to porn already

Watching porn can become compulsive, and kids are especially vulnerable to those hits of dopamine from watching it online. Like any addiction, it can cause irritability if not consumed, and interfere with everyday activities. Other symptoms include:

• Increased secrecy
• Mood changes
• Drawing or talking about sexually explicit themes
• Pulling away from friends and family

5. Porn can have lasting effects on emotional and physical well-being

Porn alters the structure and development of immature brains. Studies show that it can damage a developing prefrontal cortex. The area of your brain is critical for decision-making and impulse control—when damaged, children are more likely to act impulsive and make rash decisions.

Porn also skews children’s view of what a normal relationship, sexual and otherwise, looks like, and they can grow to expect things that aren’t reasonable or healthy from their partner. When these expectations aren’t met or enforced without consent, one or both sides of the relationship will fail.

What to Do If Your Kid Is Watching Porn

We have an entire blog post dedicated to this topic, but here’s the TL;DR:

Take the time to explain to your child why, exactly, porn can have a negative effect on them. For some families, this might mean saying that pornography is against their values or moral convictions. But for other families, this might just mean talking about how viewing pornography can give children skewed views about sex. You can also discuss how porn can perpetuate sexist views, especially when it comes to how women are treated.

How Bark Can Help

Monitoring

Bark scans online activities and alerts you when your kid is texting about porn, mentioning it in emails, or getting links to porn sites through DMs in their social media accounts. For certain devices and platforms, Bark can also monitor your child’s web searches — even if they’re using incognito mode!

Blocking

Bark’s powerful web-blocking tool helps you restrict access to what your child can get into online. You can block by category and specific site to help keep them safe. And if you’re very concerned, you could take the opposite tack and block all sites while allowing only a few trusted ones. It’s up to you! For the safest option, we recommend the Bark Phone starter plan, which comes with no internet access at all — no browsers, no apps, no social media.