Exposure to Sexual Stimuli Induces Greater Discounting Leading to Increased Involvement in Cyber Delinquency Among Men

Abstract

People frequently encounter sexual stimuli during Internet use. Research has shown that stimuli inducing sexual motivation can lead to greater impulsivity in men, as manifested in greater temporal discounting (i.e., a tendency to prefer smaller, immediate gains to larger, future ones). Extant findings in crime research suggest that delinquents tend to focus on short-term gains while failing to adequately think through the longer-term consequences of delinquent behavior. We experimentally tested the possibility that exposure to sexual stimuli is associated with the tendency to engage in cyber delinquency among men, as a result of their overly discounting remote consequences. In Experiment 1, participants exposed to pictures of “sexy” women were more likely to discount the future and were more inclined to make cyber-delinquent choices (e.g., cyberbullying, cyber fraud, cyber theft, and illegal downloading), compared with male participants who rated the sex appeal of less sexy opposite-sex pictures. However, these relationships were not observed in female participants exposed to either highly or less sexy pictures of men. In Experiment 2, male participants exposed to sexual primes showed a greater willingness to purchase a wide range of counterfeit rather than authentic products online and experienced a higher likelihood of logging into the other person's Facebook webpage (i.e., invading online privacy). The discounting tendency mediated the link between exposure to sexual primes and the inclination to engage in cyber-delinquent behavior. These findings provide insight into a strategy for reducing men's involvement in cyber delinquency; that is, through less exposure to sexual stimuli and promotion of delayed gratification. The current results suggest that the high availability of sexual stimuli in cyberspace may be more closely associated with men's cyber-delinquent behavior than previously thought.

Introduction

The proliferation of, and rapid advances in, Internet communication technology have made it easier than ever before for people to encounter sexual stimuli,¹ such as sexually explicit photos, sexually arousing films, pornographic material exchanged via online social networking and instant messaging, prostitution advertisements, pornography on Web sites, and pornography search engines and directories.² However, no previous study has examined experimentally how exposure to sexual stimuli affects men's cyber delinquency.² Recent advances in research on the association between mating motivation and impulsivity show that exposure to sexual cues can stimulate men's mating motivation, which can in turn lead to greater temporal discounting.^3–6 Temporal discounting refers to a preference for smaller, immediate rewards over larger, delayed ones.^7,8 In crime research, the tendency to discount is a key facet of low self-control^6,9–11 and plays a major role in delinquency by interfering with the capability to focus on long-term consequences of one's actions.^9,12–14 The connection between low self-control (i.e., greater temporal discounting) and cybercrime has been demonstrated in recent studies.^15–19 In the current study, we show that exposing men to sexual stimuli is associated with greater discounting and increased cyber delinquency.

In principle, impulsivity reflects a tendency toward temporal discounting^6–8 and poor self-control.^20–24 Wilson and Daly³ argued that cues activating a mating mindset or sex motive may induce men to behave impulsively, as evidenced by greater temporal discounting. Van den Bergh et al.⁵ found that sexual primes led to greater discounting in male participants. Chiou et al.⁶ demonstrated that exposure to pictures of physically attractive women is associated with greater discounting in men. Moreover, prior research has shown that exposure to sexual primes (e.g., physically attractive opposite-sex photographs or sexual scenarios) prompts a variety of behaviors, such as discounting the future,³ acting in nonconforming ways,²⁵ making a more generous donation,²⁶ displaying warring behavior,²⁷ and engaging in risk-taking behavior,⁴ among men but not women. Thus, we contend that exposure to sexual stimuli may lead to greater discounting in men, but not in women.

From the perspective of the association between self-control and crime,²⁸ delinquent acts offer immediate gains, such as money, sexual gratification, or excitement, but incur more remote costs. The extent to which individuals take distant possibilities into consideration is crucial to determine whether they will choose to commit a delinquent act or to abstain from crime.²⁹ Temporal discounting, as a manifestation of self-control, is a key tenet of several established theories and explanations of crime. For example, Nagin and Pogarsky¹³ proposed that individuals who show greater discounting are less deterred by the delayed cost of their behaviors. Similarly, Gottfredson and Hirschi⁹ indicated that people who show greater discounting have less ability to defer gratification, which leads them to engage in crime. Hence, the discounting tendency can lead to delinquency by interfering with the ability to adequately think through the future consequences of criminal behavior.¹² In addition, neuroimaging studies have shown that both temporal discounting^30,31 and morally questionable behavior^32,33 involve self-control regions in the prefrontal cortex. Furthermore, the relationship between self-control and online crime and deviance has been supported by recent empirical studies. Low self-control, as indexed by a greater discounting tendency, is a significant predictor of digital piracy,^15–18 and nondigital piracy and online deviance.¹⁹ Given that delinquency is characterized as the result of a limited ability to make informed, trade-off-based decisions between immediate gains and the distant costs of behavior, greater discounting induced by exposure to sexual stimuli may increase the tendency for cyber delinquency in men.

In sum, building on prior work showing that sexual primes can induce a greater discounting tendency among men,^3–6 and on the notion that greater discounting is related to involvement in delinquency,^9,12–14 we conducted two prime-based studies to provide experimental evidence that exposing men to sexual stimuli engenders greater discounting that leads to an increased tendency toward cyber delinquency.

Experiment 1: Sexual Primes, Discounting, and Delinquent Choices

Method

A total of 122 heterosexual undergraduates (60 women and 62 men; mean age = 20.9 years, standard deviation [SD] = 1.5) at a university in southern Taiwan participated in this experiment for extra course credit. Every two same-sex participants were assigned randomly to a one-factor (sex appeal of opposite-sex pictures: high vs. low), between-participants design.

Upon arrival, participants were informed that they were going to assist with a pilot test of several unrelated tasks that would be used in future studies. After providing written consent, participants were asked to help with a sex appeal rating task in which opposite-sex photographs were presented on computers as enlarged profile pictures would be shown from online dating sites. They were instructed to rate the sex appeal of either highly “sexy” or less sexy opposite-sex pictures using a 7-point scale (1 = not at all, 7 = very sexually appealing). The photographs were taken from our prior research.^34,35 We selected photographs that had been rated as either highly sexy (mean rating, >5.5) or less sexy (mean rating, 2.0–3.5) on a 7-point scale (1 = definitely not sexy, 7 = definitely sexy). Twenty photos of women (or men) of the same ethnicity were chosen via this selection process and presented in a random order as body images centered on a black screen. Participants were instructed to rate each picture according to “how sexually appealing you find the woman's (or man's) picture.”

The sex appeal rating task was followed by a temporal discounting task, in which participants indicated preferences related to winning the lottery; they made nine binary choices between either receiving $120 immediately or varying amounts of money in 1 year's time ($113, $120, $137, $154, $171, $189, $206, $223, and $240).³⁶ To increase involvement in the discounting task, participants were told that one of them would receive a free gift certificate to a major online retailer. They were further informed that “What you would receive is determined by random selection of one of the nine choices you make.” We calculated the discount rate, k, by employing the hyperbolic-discounting formula.³⁵ Larger values of k imply greater temporal discounting.

The final task was a questionnaire containing six cyber-delinquent choice scenarios (e.g., cyberbullying such as posting hurtful or threatening information, cyber fraud, cyber theft, illegal downloading, and the purchase of stolen goods online). Cyber delinquency prevailed in all scenarios.¹⁹ Participants' choices were made according to a 7-point scale (from very unlikely to very likely). The responses to the six scenarios were averaged to yield an index of the tendency toward cyber delinquency (α = 0.83; M = 3.74, SD = 1.26). Higher scores reflect a tendency to make more delinquent choices. None of the participants accurately guessed how these three tasks were related.

Results and discussion

Both male and female participants rated opposite-sex pictures as significantly more sexually appealing under the high sex appeal condition (male: M = 5.75, SD = 0.87; female: M = 5.52, SD = 0.93) versus the low sex appeal condition (male: M = 2.48, SD = 1.11; female: M = 2.46, SD = 1.12) (ts > 11.50, ps < 0.001), confirming that the selected photographs differed as intended.

A significant interaction between sex (male vs. female) and sex appeal (high vs. low) was found for the temporal discounting tendency (F (1, 118) = 4.57, p = 0.035, η_p² = 0.037). Male participants who rated highly sexy women showed greater discounting than those who rated less sexy women (F(1, 60) = 12.01, p = 0.001, η_p² = 0.167; Table 1). However, no difference was observed in the discounting rate between female participants in the high sex appeal condition and those in the low sex appeal condition (F = 0.057, p = 0.811; Table 1). A similar interaction was observed in the tendency toward cyber delinquency (F(1, 60) = 4.95, p = 0.028, η_p² = 0.04). As shown in Table 1, male participants in the high sex appeal condition scored significantly lower on the cyber delinquency index than those in the low sex appeal condition (F(1, 60) = 14.59, p < 0.001, η_p² = 0.196). The tendency toward cyber delinquency in female participants did not differ between the two study conditions (F = 0.543, p = 0.464; Table 1).

Table 1.

Discounting and the Tendency Toward Cyber Delinquency as a Function of the Sexual Prime Manipulation

	Experimental condition
Measure by sex	High sex appeal	Low sex appeal
Discounting rate
Male	0.61 (0.16)	0.45 (0.20)
Female	0.45 (0.18)	0.44 (0.21)
The tendency toward cyber delinquency
Male	4.61 (1.04)	3.44 (1.25)
Female	3.57 (1.20)	3.34 (1.19)

The data are presented as means (and standard deviations). Each experimental condition involved 31 men and 30 women. Larger values of the discounting rate represent greater discounting. Scores on the tendency toward cyber delinquency scale ranged from 1 to 7. Higher scores indicate a higher likelihood of choosing the cyber delinquent option.

We then tested whether temporal discounting mediated the association between exposure to sexual stimuli and the tendency toward cyber delinquency in male participants. A dummy variable was created for the experimental manipulation (1 = high sex appeal, 0 = low sex appeal), and the discounting rate was treated as the mediator. Exposure to pictures of sexy women predicted the discounting rate (B = 0.16, SE = 0.05, t = 3.47, p < 0.001), and the discounting rate predicted the tendency toward cyber delinquency (B = 4.86, SE = 0.53, t = 9.24, p < 0.001). More importantly, the effect of the sexual prime manipulation on the tendency toward cyber delinquency was not significant (from B = 1.17, SE = 0.29, t = 4.03, p < 0.001, to B = 0.40, SE = 0.27, t = 1.93, p > 0.05) when the discounting rate was included in the equation. A bootstrap analysis³⁷ showed that the 95 percent bias-corrected confidence interval (CI) for the indirect effect (B = 0.78, SE = 0.26; bootstrap resamples = 5,000) excluded zero (CI: 0.32–1.33), suggesting a significant indirect effect (see Fig. 1).

FIG. 1.

Mediation of the effect of exposure to sexual primes (i.e., pictures of sexy women; 1 = high sex appeal, 0 = low sex appeal) on the tendency toward cyber delinquency among male participants in Experiment 1. Values are standardized regression coefficients. Larger values of the discounting rate indicate greater temporal discounting. On the lower path, the values below and above the arrow are the results of analyses in which the mediator was and was not included in the model, respectively. Asterisks indicate significant path coefficients (*p < 0.05).

Our first experiment demonstrated that men exposed to pictures of sexy women showed greater discounting and were more inclined to engage in cyber-delinquent acts. This finding accords with prior research showing that cues chosen to heighten a sexual motivation can increase temporal discounting among men.^3–6 Given that exposure to sexy opposite-sex photographs was not associated with women's discounting or tendency toward cyber delinquency, the next experiment involved only male participants.

Experiment 2: Sexual Primes and the Tendency to Purchase Counterfeits Online and Invade Online Privacy

Method

A total of 72 heterosexual male undergraduates (mean age = 20.6 years, SD = 1.3) were recruited to this experiment via campus posters. Participants were assigned randomly to receive either sexual or neutral primes.

Upon arrival in the lab, the participants were told that they would engage in two unrelated tasks: a picture rating task and a consumer decision-making questionnaire. Two sets of 15 pictures constituted the stimuli for the picture rating task. In the sexual prime condition, 15 pictures of sexually arousing clothing items (e.g., bras, thongs, and sexy lingerie) were displayed in random order on a computer screen. In the neutral prime condition, 15 pictures of ordinary clothing items (e.g., T-shirts, long skirts, and dresses) were shown to the participants. Participants were instructed to imagine that they were buying a gift and were reviewing the shopping options online. They were then asked to rate each item of clothing on several dimensions (e.g., color, design, quality, sexual arousal, and texture).

After the sexual prime manipulation, participants completed an ostensibly unrelated survey online. The first part of this online questionnaire was the discounting measure, which was identical to that of Experiment 1. The second part was a marketing survey, in which participants indicated their purchasing choices for 12 different pairs of products across various product categories (e.g., clothing, watches, glasses, DVDs, and fashion luxuries).³⁸ Each pair consisted of an authentic product of a famous brand and a counterfeit product. Pictures and prices of each product were provided. Participants' were instructed to make choices by imagining that they were purchasing the products online. The dependent measure was the number of counterfeit products chosen for online purchase (range: 0–12). In addition, we created a situation to test the effect of exposure to sexual stimuli on invasion of privacy. Once participants submitted the online questionnaire, the computer screen jumped to the Facebook login webpage, in which the account and password of the experimenter had already been stored. Whether participants would log into the other person's Facebook webpage served as a dependent measure of invasion of online privacy. During the probing, no participants correctly guessed the actual purpose of the experiment, or how the prime manipulation and our dependent measures were related.

Results and discussion

The sexual arousal rating (range: 1–5) indicated that participants rated clothing pictures as significantly more sexually arousing under the sexual prime condition (M = 4.12, SD = 0.69) versus the neutral prime condition (M = 1.94, SD = 0.59; t(70) = 14.23, p < 0.001, η_p² = 0.746). Table 2 shows that participants exposed to sexually arousing clothing showed greater discounting than those exposed to ordinary clothing t(70) = 2.87, p = 0.005, η_p² = 0.105). More importantly, participants in the sexual prime condition were willing to purchase more counterfeit products online than those in the neutral prime condition [t(70) = 3.25, p = 0.002, η_p² = 0.131; Table 2].

Table 2.

Discounting, the Tendency to Purchase Counterfeits Online, and Online Privacy Invasion as a Function of the Sexual Prime Manipulation

	Experimental condition
Measure	Sexual prime	Neutral prime
Discounting rate	0.59 (0.18)	0.46 (0.21)
Number of counterfeits chosen for purchase online	4.69 (1.31)	3.61 (1.52)
Proportion of invading privacy online	0.67 (0.08)	0.39 (0.08)

The data are presented as means (and standard deviations). Each condition involved 36 participants. Larger values of the discounting rate represent greater temporal discounting. The number of online counterfeits chosen to purchase online ranged from 0 to 12.

The mediating role of discounting on the connection between sexual stimuli and the tendency to purchase counterfeits online was examined. We created a dummy variable for our experimental manipulation (1 = sexual prime, 0 = neutral prime). The sexual prime manipulation predicted the discounting rate (B = 0.13, SE = 0.05, t = 2.87, p = 0.006), the discounting rate predicted the number of counterfeits chosen for purchase online (B = 5.09, SE = 0.63, t = 8.06, p < 0.001), and the effect of the sexual prime manipulation on the number of counterfeits chosen for purchase online was not significant (from B = 1.08, SE = 0.33, t = 3.25, p = 0.002, to B = 0.42, SE = 0.25, t = 1.64, p > 0.05) when the discounting rate was included in the equation. A bootstrap analysis showed that the 95 percent bias-corrected CI (0.24–1.26) for the indirect effect (B = 0.66, SE = 0.25; bootstrap resamples = 5,000) was significant.

A logistic regression indicated that the likelihood of logging into another person's Facebook webpage was associated with the sexual prime manipulation (χ²[1, N = 72] = 5.65, p = 0.017). Participants receiving sexual primes were more likely to invade privacy (66.7 percent, 24 of 36) than those receiving neutral primes (38.9 percent, 14 of 36; B = 1.15, SE = 0.49, Wald = 5.42, odds ratio = 3.13, 95 percent CI: 1.20–8.24). Moreover, the effect of the sexual prime manipulation on the likelihood of logging into the other person's Facebook webpage was not significant (from Wald = 5.42, Z = 2.33, p = 0.02, to Wald = 0.72, Z = 0.85, p = 0.396) when the discounting rate was controlled for. A bootstrap analysis showed that the 95 percent bias-corrected CI (0.25–2.79) for the indirect effect (B = 1.34, SE = 0.71; bootstrap resamples = 5,000) was significant, indicating that the discounting tendency mediated the link between exposure to sexual primes and the likelihood of logging into the other person's Facebook webpage.

As predicted, the sexual prime manipulation was associated with a greater discounting tendency, a higher inclination toward purchasing counterfeits online, and a higher likelihood of invading privacy online. These results are consistent with those of Experiment 1 and provide strong support for the hypothesis that exposure to sexual cues may induce greater discounting, leading to the tendency toward cyber delinquency.

General Discussion

We conducted two primed-based experiments to demonstrate that the greater discounting (Experiments 1 and 2) induced by sexual stimuli was associated with the tendency toward cyber-delinquent choices (Experiment 1), willingness to purchase counterfeits online (Experiment 2), and the likelihood of invading privacy online (Experiment 2) among men. These results have important practical implications, as decreasing exposure to sexual stimuli and the tendency to discount the future can reduce the propensity toward criminality among men.

Our findings complement the priming literature by showing that exposure to sexual primes was associated with cyber-delinquent choices in men. The mediation analysis suggested that sexual primes may engender a “short-sighted” self state in men, which leads to them yielding to short-term gains while failing to consider the long-term costs of delinquent behavior. These findings are congruent with the active-self account of priming effects,³⁹ which proposes that an activated mental representation (i.e., placing more emphasis on immediate gain in the current context) mediates perceptual or behavioral priming effects.^40–43 For example, priming with social networking sites can boost the sense of relatedness among users, which leads to reduced distress due to social exclusion.⁴⁴ Experiencing brightness may heighten the salience of moral consideration to self, thereby leading people to perform ethical deeds.⁴⁵ In addition, the discounting tendency was associated with the tendency toward cyber-delinquent choices, purchasing counterfeits online, and invading online privacy. These findings fit into Gottfredson and Hirschi's general theory of crime,⁹ indicating that low self-control, as manifested by greater discounting, is an important predictor of crime.

Some limitations of this study should be discussed. Both experiments involved undergraduate students. Thus, caution should be exercised regarding sample representativeness. Age differences in temporal orientation have been observed in lifespan samples.^46,47 Future studies should examine whether the effect of exposure to sexual stimuli on men's discounting would result in different developmental timetables. In addition, not measuring baseline impulsivity and self-control before the experimental manipulation could limit the assessment of discounting change. Moreover, the present findings pertain to immediate effects in a laboratory setting. The longevity of the effect of sexual priming on men's cyber delinquency is an important question for future research. Previous research has investigated priming phenomena that lasted over days, months, or years.^48–50 A longitudinal design may have allowed us to examine the temporal duration and persistence of the effect of sexual priming on subsequent involvement in cyber delinquency.

In conclusion, the current results demonstrate an association between sexual stimuli (e.g., exposure to pictures of sexy women or sexually arousing clothing) and men's involvement in cyber delinquency. Our findings suggest that men's impulsivity and self-control, as manifested by temporal discounting, are susceptible to failure in the face of ubiquitous sexual stimuli. Men may benefit from monitoring whether exposure to sexual stimuli is associated with their subsequent delinquent choices and behavior. Our findings suggest that encountering sexual stimuli can tempt men down the road of cyber delinquency.

Footnotes

Acknowledgment

This research was partially supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan (contract No. MOST 105-2410-H-110-039-MY2).

Author Disclosure Statement

No competing financial interests exist.

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