Over on "Further Light and Knowedge" website, there was a particularly good post by SteveM. The information he provides provides a good counterpoint to the studies Makelan cited earlier in this thread. I'm not saying that they Trump Makelan's citations, but I'm offering them as something further to consider.
Here it is.
Virtually all of my non-Mormon male friends masturbate regularly and look at pornography on occasion (and they're quite open about it). But none of them are "addicted" to either. That is to say, none of them compulsively masturbate or view pornography for hours on end. Neither of these habits control their lives.
Yet, when Mormons look at porn, they frequently become compulsive users who are unable to control the habit. In General Authority speak, they become "addicted."
I think this contrast illustrates why it is important to distinguish between an addiction and a compulsive habit. While compulsions may be similar to addictions in many respects, they are not one in the same. For instance, if you smoke cigarettes regularly, it's likely that you will become addicted; the nicotine will physically addict the user, regardless of his or her personal beliefs and attitudes.
With masturbation and pornography, this is not so. I've never read anything that suggests that there's anything inherently addicting about either. I've heard conservatives suggests that the endorphins that are released while masturbating or viewing pornography can become a "natural drug" to which users become addicted, but this is unlikely. Physical exercise such as jogging triggers the release of endorphins, but I don't think we have much of a problem with "running addicts." There's a difference between "masturbation feels good" and "I need to masturbate right now!"
Whether or not someone becomes a compulsive masturbator/porn user seems to have a lot to do with their personal attitudes and experiences with sex and sexuality. Those who have been sexually abused, those who are sexually repressed, those with negative attitudes about sex, and those with high levels of sexual guilt are more likely to become involved in a compulsive habit. Sexual guilt, shame, and pressure only reinforce the habit. Those with open, positive, shame-free attitudes about sex may enjoy masturbating or looking at porn, but it's less likely that they will become "addicted" to them.
This is rather ironic, as it seems that past and current LDS teachings regarding sexuality and pornography may actually create and contribute to the sexual problems and compulsive habits that they condemn.
Levi S. Peterson wrote that "prudery reinforces pornogrphy" ("In Defense of Mormon Erotica," Dialogue 20:4, Winter 1987). A 1997 U.S. News article (link:
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/ar ... 006163.htm) states that while "[t]he Reagan-Bush war on pornography coincided...with a dramatic increase in America's consumption of sexually explicit materials," Denmark's liberalization of obscenity laws actually led to "a long, steady decline" in pornography consumption that continues to this day. According to the article "Husband-wife Similarity in Response to Erotic Stimuli" (Journal of Personality, Vol. 43, Issue 3, p. 385-394), those with more restrictive, more negative, and more authoritarian views of sexuality are more aroused by pornographic stimuli. The article "Sexual Guilt and Religion" (The Family Coordinator, Vol. 28, Issue 3, p. 353-357) discusses a study showing that while sexual guilt is more influential than religion in predicting sexual attitudes and behavior, "the more frequently [people] attend church, the more likely they are to have high sexual guilt which interferes with their sexuality." In other words, religion can lead to sexual guilt, and sexual guilt can lead to unhealthy sexual behaviors such as compulsive masturbating and porn use.
God . . . "who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, . . . and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him ..."