Sexologists say your favorite porn genre reveals a lot about you

Just like your dreams can be interpreted based on your current situation and tell a lot about your mindset, porn genres and what you prefer and dislike apparently have a way of revealing certain things about your past.

Whether that’s softcore porn, crossdressing, or the hardcore stuff, sexologists believe their theories can help us understand the human mind better and what induces the fantasies we have. Thing is, for most of us the first sexual encounter was whether through an adult magazine or a movie and then you started discovering your natural urges and had your first sexual experience. All this may seem normal and quite mundane, but truth is, it can definitely carry a much deeper meaning than we initially think.

Why That One in Particular?

There are hundreds of thousands if not millions of porn videos categorized in hundreds of categories at the touch of a button. You can be anywhere and watch anything you want for as long as you like. So, out of the hundreds of porn styles and categories, orientations, topics, and plots, why do you specifically like those?

All of us don’t think about what’s in the background behind our preferred genre. We’re only watching at what’s happening in front of the screen and what your hand is doing. However, somewhere behind all those compulsive activities, a lot is going on.

This is why we have decided to work more on the mystery behind preferred porn genres and consult with few scientists on the topic.

The connection between the porn genre and your life

When asked, all of the sex experts practically said the same. People, consciously or unconsciously, choose the porn genre based on their previous life experiences. It is important to dwell deeper in these likings as it can help you dive into your past and learn a lot about yourself.

“People intensely focus while watching pornography movies. It takes their mental and physical attention and engages their emotions, making them feel good and wanting more of what they just saw.” Says Maura Barley, a psychologist specializing in sexology and human fantasies. When a person first encounters with some form of sexual content, their brain, based on previous experiences, marks it as enjoyable or not without telling them. Experts say this is a way we develop certain tastes or even fetishized porn interests like MILFs or bondage, or other kinds.

For instance, people who get turned on by being shamed by someone else while masturbating or having sex, oftentimes admit they were harshly shamed for masturbation as a teen, so now their brain, as a way to cope with the negative experience, has turned that negative experience into positive, something that turns them on. Spanking in the same thing, if your parents spanked you a lot and called you bad as a child, there is a possibility you might like that while you climax.

Dr. Vanessa Goldsmith shares a story from her practice. “A few years back I had a client who was into crossdressing porn but as a straight male, couldn’t understand why. Frankly, he was quite perplexed by it but he understood that that preference is there for a reason, something he must discover and learn from instead of simply pushing it aside.” There is a possibility that not everything you are turned on has its roots in your past. It is often the case that people get sexually aroused by something they cannot have. This can be further explained by our hormones. Namely, dopamine is a chemical that makes us feel good and is released as rewarding and motivation as a result of doing something good. Thing is, this chemical is higher when we anticipate pleasure as opposed to when we receive pleasure. This can serve as an explanation of why MILF porn is so popular among heterosexuals.

The old theory that you’re fantasizing about your mother (yikes!!) is out of the window, as Dr. Vanessa explains, you might be only excited about being in control and being with someone more experienced. She believes that stripping down porn to just physical experience is wrong. People need to realize that sexual experience is all about emotional fulfillment too. This is what attached us to it actually, the emotional not only the physical side.

The evolution theory

Sex therapist Dr. Liam Garcia links pornography preferences to something even further than your childhood. He states that apart from your past experiences, evolution plays a big role too. When we asked for an example, he said cucking (when men get turned on by watching their wives have sex with other men) is one of the more obvious examples of our history of mate guarding. Namely, in cave times men had to compete with one another (more bluntly than now) for a woman, so the jealousy of the competing creates anticipation and excitement which relates to sexual excitement too.

Leave mystery be

Ultimately, all experts agreed that no one has the final answer. Something like pornography genre preference is very personal and intimate to oversimplify it and generalize it to all people. Everyone orgasms out of different reasons and as long as you’re not hurting anyone and everything is consensual, then your sex and porn consumption is totally fine.

Maybe even the part of not knowing why you do what you do is the interesting part, so why ruin the mystery by diving deep and judging something as acceptable or bad?