Sociocultural contexts

Recognising these influences can support more informed and effective prevention and response.

Rough sex has become an increasingly common practice within contemporary sexual culture. Depictions of rough sex are now widespread across pornography, social media, and streaming platforms, where it is often portrayed as normal, desirable, pleasurable, and a marker of sexual confidence, adventurousness, and agency.

The mainstreaming and eroticisation of rough sex within these contexts have contributed to its integration into youth sexual culture, with international research suggesting approximately 40-70% of young people have experienced some form of rough sex.

Young people engage in rough sex for a variety of reasons. Some describe motivations such as curiosity, perceived pleasure, and dominance play. However, many also identify broader social and cultural influences, including peer pressure, sexual norms shaped by online environments, partner expectations, beliefs about what is normal or desirable, and concerns about being perceived as "vanilla" if they don’t participate.

Despite widespread media portrayals of rough sex, the risks associated with it are seldom depicted online, discussed with adults, or included in relationships and sexuality education. As a result, many young people learn about rough sex from peers or online, reinforcing the social norms and expectations that shape their understanding of the practice.

Rough sex should also always be considered within the broader continuum of gendered sexual norms, power dynamics, and sexual harm. Women, both cis and trans, transfeminine people, and, in depictions of sex between men, trans men, transmasculine people and more feminine-presenting men, are disproportionately targeted in both online depictions of rough sex and offline experiences of it; mirroring and reinforcing broader gendered socialisation patterns.

As rough sex becomes increasingly common within contemporary sexual culture, aggression may also be minimised or reframed as “just sex”, blurring the boundaries between consensual sexual experiences and sexual harm. Within intimate partner violence and sexual assault, the term rough sex may also be used to sanitise or justify sexually violent behaviour, with acts of sexual assault reframed or defended as “rough sex.”

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