--- title: Porn: 'Fifty Shades of Grey' Turns Women Into Porn Users, Study Says description: 'Fifty Shades of Grey' makes women increase their consumption of sexually explicit content, according to a University of Waterloo study canonical: https://time.com/3708659/fifty-shades-of-grey-women-porn/ author: Sabrina Toppa article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-02-13T08:09:54.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T08:56:44.412Z og:title: 'Fifty Shades' Gets Women Into Porn, Study Finds og:description: Researchers say women use more porn after reading the book. og:url: https://time.com/3708659/fifty-shades-of-grey-women-porn/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: 'Fifty Shades' Gets Women Into Porn, Study Finds twitter:description: Researchers say women use more porn after reading the book. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # _Fifty Shades of Grey_ Gets Women Into Porn, Research Says by [Sabrina Toppa](https://time.com/author/sabrina-toppa/) ## Sabrina Toppa Feb 13, 2015 8:09 AM UTC by [Sabrina Toppa](https://time.com/author/sabrina-toppa/) ## Sabrina Toppa Feb 13, 2015 8:09 AM UTC E.L. James’ _Fifty Shades of Grey_ is [introducing](http://www.salon.com/2015/02/12/research%5Fshows%5F50%5Fshades%5Fis%5Fa%5Fgateway%5Fdrug%5Ffor%5Fwomen%5Fand%5Fporn/) more women to porn — at least according to a narrow study conducted at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. Researcher Diana Parry interviewed 28 women in their 20s to 50s about their pornography habits. She discovered that women in the group increased their consumption of sexually explicit content after reading the book. “So many of the women \[we interviewed\] were hopping in for the first time to pornography or sexually explicit material that was written by women for women,” Parry told [Salon](http://www.salon.com/2015/02/12/research%5Fshows%5F50%5Fshades%5Fis%5Fa%5Fgateway%5Fdrug%5Ffor%5Fwomen%5Fand%5Fporn/) in an interview. “I find it’s motivating women. It is exposing them to a genre of material that they either didn’t know existed or they didn’t know that they liked,” the professor said. Parry employed a broad definition of porn, using a catchall label of “sexually explicit material” to reduce stigma surrounding erotica, porn websites and other sexual entertainment. “But I think we need a cautionary note around it, because while they open up opportunities and provide women with unprecedented access to new genres or ways of thinking about their sexuality, at the same time, many of the scripts that are reproduced are really patriarchal scripts around women’s sexuality.” \[[_Salon_](http://www.salon.com/2015/02/12/research%5Fshows%5F50%5Fshades%5Fis%5Fa%5Fgateway%5Fdrug%5Ffor%5Fwomen%5Fand%5Fporn/)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3708659/fifty-shades-of-grey-women-porn/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3708659/fifty-shades-of-grey-women-porn/"},"headline":"Fifty Shades of Grey Gets Women Into Porn, Research Says","datePublished":"2015-02-13T08:09:54.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T08:56:44.412Z","description":"After reading the best-selling book, some women begin using pornography for the first time","url":"https://time.com/3708659/fifty-shades-of-grey-women-porn/","keywords":["Living","Pornography","Sex","Research","sexuality","Culture","Fifty Shades of Grey"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Sabrina Toppa","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/sabrina-toppa/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-living/","name":"Living"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3708659/fifty-shades-of-grey-women-porn/","name":"Fifty Shades of Grey Gets Women Into Porn, Research Says"}}]}] ```