In 2022, the world watched aghast as Russian troops invaded the European country of Ukraine. A group of psychologists viewed this as an opportunity to conduct a natural experiment to monitor how the stress and fears of being in a country under attack and at war would impact people’s viewing of pornography. By this point, it was well-established that many people use pornography as a way to cope with loneliness, stress, and depression.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many people predicted there would be a massive surge in pornography use, with people stuck at home, stressed, and bored. Researchers monitored pornography use during 2020 and surprisingly found that while there was a temporary increase for a few months in pornography viewing, levels of viewing returned to baseline levels by late summer in 2020 (before there was even a vaccine and while social distancing and quarantining were still required). These results showed that while people do use pornography to cope with negative emotions, it’s often a short-term accommodation.

The study's researchers gathered data from two sources: Pornhub Insights and Google Trends. Pornhub, the largest pornography site in the world, regularly publishes data on the behaviors and choices of its site visitors. This is the origin of those memes we so often see describing sexual interests in different states. They have that data, as well as data showing the frequency of pornography searches from specific........

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