Exploring the Emotional Dynamics of Couples Dealing with Pornography Addiction
Keywords:
problematic pornography use, emotional dynamics, couples, marital intimacy, trust, qualitative researchAbstract
This study aimed to explore the emotional dynamics of couples dealing with problematic pornography use and to explain their lived experiences of trust disruption, intimacy erosion, emotional regulation, and marital interaction. This qualitative study was conducted using a descriptive phenomenological approach. The participants consisted of 24 individuals, including 12 married couples living in Tehran, in which at least one partner reported problematic pornography use and its emotional or relational consequences. Participants were recruited through purposive sampling from family counseling and couple therapy centers in Tehran, and recruitment continued until theoretical saturation was reached. Data were collected through in-depth semi-structured interviews. Each interview lasted between 50 and 80 minutes. The data were analyzed through thematic analysis with the assistance of NVivo software. To enhance trustworthiness, member checking, peer coding, prolonged engagement with the data, and an audit trail were used. The analysis yielded four main categories: the cycle of shame, secrecy, and gradual disclosure; damage to trust and the experience of emotional-sexual betrayal; erosion of sexual intimacy and bodily self-worth; and maladaptive and restorative attempts at emotional regulation within the relationship. Participants did not experience pornography use merely as an individual behavior. Rather, they described it as a relational phenomenon intertwined with silence, anger, rejection, bodily comparison, surveillance, avoidance, and, in some cases, restorative dialogue. The findings indicated that problematic pornography use in marital relationships may function as an emotional-interactional cycle in which the user’s shame, the partner’s insecurity, declining trust, and reduced intimacy mutually reinforce one another. Couple therapy interventions should therefore move beyond behavioral control and address trust reconstruction, emotion regulation, safe sexual communication, and the reduction of relational shame.
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