When Porn is the Issue–Working with Couples and Individuals

Course Description:
We’re seeing more and more couples in conflict over one partner’s porn use. The most common clinical approach to this problem pathologizes one partner’s porn use while legitimizing the grievances of the porn consumer’s partner. This violates our commitment to neutrality—and more importantly, it doesn’t help the couple.

To address porn-related issues more effectively, this workshop will focus on treating intrapsychic conflicts, power struggles, and existential issues relating to porn use. We’ll look at how one or both partners may be acting out body image issues; and why “porn addiction” is not a helpful concept.

We’ll explore how conflict about pornography is often used to avoid confronting a sexual relationship’s deficits. And we’ll look at various sexual issues—such as desire, arousal, and masturbation—that should be raised when working with these cases. We’ll learn how to help porn consumers and their partners disclose and discuss the state of their sexual relationship, and identify specific problems they would like to address.

We’ll also look at working with individuals who are discontent with their own porn use. They may feel out of control; may feel upset about the content that they prefer; may feel guilty about keeping a secret, or about their low desire for their partner; or may keep making poor choices about how much, when, where, and what to view. How do we work with these people—agreeing that they’re making poor choices—without adding to their shame, self-criticism, and sense of isolation?

Finally, we’ll look at our field’s beliefs and standards for a moment. How do we define “sexual health” in this context? What is our vision of healthy porn use? And if we don’t have such a vision, what does that say about our ability to support all of our clients?

Learning Objectives:
At the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Name 2 common assumptions of therapists about porn
• Discuss the latest data on whether porn use leads to anti-social behavior
• Explain two limitations of the porn addiction model
• Describe common power dynamics in couples in conflict about porn

Speaker Bio:
Marty Klein, PhD has been an MFT and Certified Sex Therapist for 39 years. A founding editorial board member of the Journal of Porn Studies, his recent book (his 7^th) is His Porn, Her Pain: Confronting America’s PornPanic With Honest Talk About Sex. Marty has trained tens of thousands of professionals in human sexuality in over 40 countries; audiences invariably describe his workshops as thought-provoking, down-to-earth, and entertaining.

Marty appears regularly in national media such as The New York Times, National Public Radio, and the Daily Show. Regularly called upon to give expert testimony in human sexuality in state and federal courts, he recently gave two Congressional briefings on evidence-based sex education. His award-winning Sexual Intelligence blog is at www.SexEd.org.

Class originally recorded: 4/17/2021.

Social workers completing this course receive 4 clinical continuing education credits.