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Harriet Marsden
Jun 13, 2017
Picture:
vadimguzhva / istock
If your eyes are the window to your soul, then our internet browsing history could be a window into humanity.
To clarify: people's porn habits are a fascinating reflection on current affairs, trends and society.
The world's most popular porn site, PornHub, boasts around 10 million videos and receives 75 million visitors a day from all over the world, so it's probably best placed to comment on people's viewing pleasure.
Tthe site is celebrating its 10-year-anniversary by delving into – and publishing – all the secretive habits of those visitors.
This is no questionable survey or opinon-based vox-pop. This is real, empirical data related to sexual fantasies, as well as an incredible insight into how current affairs can influence them.
New York Magazine calls it "the Kinsey report of our time," referencing two famous books on sexual behaviour from the mid-20th Century.
Here's what we learnt about what people are getting off on:
- Millennials love cosplay (sex in costume, dressing up as fantasy characters, etc.)
- Women from Brazil and the Philippines love the site
- People browse the redhead category for only six and a half minutes, as opposed to the average 11 minutes spent on the old / young category
- The most popular category among female users is 'lesbian'
Here's what we learnt about when people are getting off:
- Midnight is the most popular time for users
- There is a 17 per cent drop in traffic on Valentine's Day, after 6pm​
- Traffic declines by 45 per cent on Christmas Eve
- But then rises 34 per cent early Christmas morning
- Searches for 'elf' go up 454 per cent around the holiday period
And here's what we learnt about how current events can affect people's pornographic preferences:
- 2012 saw a huge rise in demand for yoga porn
- The search 'Cuban maid' spiked after Fidel Castro died
- Traffic grew around 10 per cent after Donald Trump officially won the presidency
- Searches for 'golden showers' spiked by 289 per cent in January after those claims
Maureen O'Connor writes in New York magazine:
Taken as a whole, [Pornhub's] vast trove of smut is the Kinsey Report of our time, shedding light on the multiplicity of erotic desires and sexual behaviours in our midst.