Watching online porn can interfere with your short-term memory, researchers have found.
The German study saw a test group of 28 heterosexual men, with an average age of 26, exposed to a series of pornographic and non-pornographic images.
They were then told to answer "yes" or "no" when asked if the image they were looking at matched the image four slides previously.
Online porn can interfere with short-term memory, researchers have found
The results revealed men guessed correctly 80 per cent of the time while looking at the normal images, and only 67 per cent of the time with the pornographic images.
The findings were published in the November edition of the Journal of Sex Research.
It emerged the men's recollection of the pornographic images was even poorer when they acknowledged sensations of sexual arousal and urges to masturbate.
Study author Christian Laier said: "Sexual arousal interferes with working memory, in important facet of executive functioning."
SEE ALSO:
The results of the study may go towards explaining why straight men who are addicted to online porn may have have difficulties including: "Missing sleep and forgetting appointments, which are associated with negative life consequences."
Its goal, in essence, is to find out why porn and sex addictions can stop men from functioning efficiently in their lives when they're not between the sheets or in front of a screen.
Laier, a graduate studying under psychologist Matthias Brand at the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany, added: "The study is a first step. Our results need to be tested with respect to gender and sexual orientation to verify."
In May last year China's state media channel CCTV reported that porn accessible via Google was causing citizens to lose their memories.
An interviewee - who later turned out to be an intern at the broadcaster - declared: "I have this fellow student and he's been curious about these kinds of things.