The spike in eating disorders among men is an ‘uphill battle’—and porn is partly to blame

Roughly 6% of study participants reported problematic porn use, which was defined as “uncontrollable pattern of pornography use resulting in significant distress and adverse consequences.” The study, which included 705 Israeli men across sexual orientations with a mean age of 32.5, mirrors an uptick of eating disorders among boys and young men in the United States.

According to the National Eating Disorders Association, about one in three people with an eating disorder is male and an estimated 10 million boys and men in the United States are expected to experience an eating disorder at some point in their lifetime.

“Males with eating disorders come in all shapes and sizes—everything from underweight and emaciated to people who would call themselves fat to people who are very muscular,” says Erin Parks, Ph.D., cofounder of Equip, a virtual eating disorder treatment model, who was not associated with the study. “I think it’s important that we don’t think of a certain type of person when we think about eating disorders and understand that there are a lot of different ways to arrive at an eating disorder.” 

The problem with (too much) porn

“If you go back in time to when we didn’t have Instagram or PornHub, the number of images you’d see is significantly fewer than the images you see today,” says Parks. “As a teenager, I could flip through a beauty magazine and it would take me 30 minutes to consume 100 images. Now in 30 minutes, I can consume 10,000 images of our culture’s perceived ideal body type and I’m scrolling through Instagram, and it’s the same with pornography.”

Decades ago, our brains’ perception of what people look like was also largely influenced by in-person interactions. Now, with the rise in working from home and the country’s overall loneliness epidemic, a good number of those images are coming from devices, whether it’s our smartphones or laptops.

“Whether it’s pornography or social media, our ideas of what humans should look like, which is what we judge ourselves with, is being wildly skewed by having so much interaction with people we’ve never met before and are Facetuned to look perfectly,” says Parks.

When it comes to eating disorders, the stereotype of a young, thin girl is prevalent, and it’s keeping people from recognizing that everyone is susceptible.

“The stereotype is really quite narrow [when it comes to eating disorders], and as a result we’re really conscious about how we talk to thin white girls because you’re already primed to think this might be someone who doesn’t like their body or is prone to an eating disorder,” explains Parks. “We need to take what we do for those 15- to 25-year-old thin white girls and apply that same thinking toward everyone.”

What a preoccupation with food and body could mean

If someone demonstrates a preoccupation with food and/or their body and its shape, they may have an eating disorder.

“Whether someone is 6 years old or 60 years old, all races, ethnicities, and cultures, all genders can relate to this idea of wanting to have control over your own thoughts,” says Parks. 

One of the tools she uses to assess people’s risk of an eating disorder is to ask them how often they think about food or their weight on a scale of one to 10, with 10 being all the time. People who are struggling will often reply eight to 10; however, the information lies in determining how often they want to think about food or their body.

“That’s usually when I get a number between two and five,” says Parks. “That discrepancy between how often they’re thinking about food and how often they want to think about food is the eating disorder.”

Other signs of an eating disorder

While there are several different types of eating disorders, the most common ones are: 

• Anorexia nervosa, which is typically characterized by self-starvation and drastic weight loss
• Bulimia nervosa, which can include eating only low-calorie foods or binge-eating high-calorie foods
• Binge eating disorder, which is common among adolescents and involves eating a large quantity of food in a short period of time

Each eating disorder has different symptoms; however, an unhealthy preoccupation with food and weight is common among all.

Other signs of an eating disorder include: 

• Severe weight loss
• Change in mood
• Excessive exercising
• Avoiding mealtimes
• Elimination of certain food groups, such as carbs or sugar 
• Stomach cramps or other gastrointestinal issues
• Menstrual irregularities
• Muscle weakness
• Weak immune system

How to treat eating disorders

For people under the age of 22, Parks recommends family-based treatment for eating disorders. 

“Certainly for adolescents and teenagers, many of them are not keen on doing treatment with their parents, which totally makes sense. And yet, it is the modality of treatment that gives the highest chance of recovery and it helps prevent future relapse,” she says. “No one should have to go through something hard alone, whether that’s a divorce, a death, or an eating disorder. It’s about bringing in people to help you do hard things.”

Other treatment plans include:

• Cognitive behavioral therapy 
• Dialectical behavior therapy
• Temperament-based treatment with support 

Research suggests up to 40% of people with eating disorders identify as male, according to Parks. She’s optimistic that the company’s virtual treatment model, complete with a five-person team that includes a therapist, physician, dietitian, family mentor, and a peer mentor, can help erase the stigma when it comes to men and eating disorders.

“Men definitely have eating disorders; they just haven’t had a safe place to get treatment or someone in their life who’s going to identify that they need treatment,” she says. “So they have an uphill battle because most men are not going to get diagnosed, and even if they do, they may not feel like they have safe treatment options.”