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Most research concentrates on the negative effects experienced by wives as a result of their husbands’ preoccupation, but there is little concentration on women who bring their individual psychodynamics to a complex marital relationship. I conducted in-depth interviews with 16 women in an effort to comprehend how they understood and managed their husbands’ Internet activities. I used grounded theory to analyze the women’s experiences. The women in my study narrate a cycle of men’s use of pornography and their own efforts to manage and cope with this knowledge. The wives find themselves locked in a cycle in their efforts to dissuade husbands from using the Internet. Repeated discoveries of Internet activity, confrontations with spouses, threats, promises and temporary behavioral changes on the part of husbands, and then more discoveries mark the cycle. It is a repetitive cycle, and for the most part, is an integral part of the marital relationship almost from its inception. Each person’s individual psychodynamics contributes to and perpetuates this cycle. This highly charged cycle appears to be a permanent fixture in the relationship, and the women report an inability to break or affect permanent change. The presence of this cycle is an interesting aspect of the marital relationship and raises many questions about its unconscious function in the relationship.
Nine discrete yet related findings raise some interesting questions. These women report that accessing Internet pornography is a piece of a larger problem; viewing of online pornography is only the tip of the iceberg for many of the women. All the women in the study had prior untreated developmental deficits due to parental interferences, neglect, emotional and physical abuse, or sexual trauma. Deeper characterological issues contribute to participants’ inability to say “No” (and mean it) or to disengage from the repetitive cycle. In addition, all the women describe problems that existed early in the relationship.
Since my study concluded in 2005, Internet pornography continues to generate academic, political, and popular interest. Much of the academic work remains focused on the user and on the addictive nature of Internet pornography, ignoring a psychoanalytic perspective. Philaretou, Mahfouz, and Allen (2005) examine Internet pornography and men’s well being. Yoder, Virden, and Amin (2005) research Internet pornography and user loneliness.