Children are developing permissive attitudes to sex and viewing women as objects after being raised on a "diet of pornography", a major British study has found.
For the first time, the Children's Commissioner for England has found a clear link between exposure to extreme images at a young age and a rise in "risky behaviours".
It emerged that children who regularly viewed pornography were more likely to have underage sex, develop "casual and hedonistic" attitudes, experiment with drink and drugs and indulge in sexting, when explicit pictures are taken and sent to others using camera phones.
Boys were much more likely to be exposed to pornography than girls, it was found, resulting in "beliefs that women are sex objects".
The study, based on a large-scale review of international evidence, also found some evidence of a relationship between explicit images and a rise in sexual aggression and harassment of the opposite sex.
