The PORN-TYPES project is coordinated by dr. Samira van Bohemen and is embedded within the Erasmus Love Lab (ELL) and the Erasmus Institute on Culture and Stratification (EICS), both located at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
The Erasmus Love Lab combines insights and methods from the social and behavioral sciences to study intimate relationships, love, and sexuality. Its interdisciplinary mission is unique in the Netherlands and beyond. The ELL features a unique physical lab space designed as a homely lounge, providing an ecologically valid atmosphere for data collection. This setup adheres to the highest standards for protecting privacy and ensuring the comfort of participants in research on sensitive topics.
The Erasmus Institute on Culture and Stratification integrates the PI’s expertise in the cultural sociological study of sexuality as it pertains to gender, race, and ethnicity with the substantial knowledge of colleagues specializing in the theorization and measurement of culture shaping social inequality. Additionally, this institute boasts wide-ranging expertise in understanding how different social groups view controversial issues, why they hold these views, and how these perspectives drive their actions.
Principal Investigator
Samira van Bohemen is an Associate Professor of Cultural Sociology at Erasmus University. Her research examines how various social groups experience pleasure and its links to identity and inequality, with a particular focus on sexual pleasure. She recently received a prestigious Vidi grant from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) for her work in this area.
Software engineer and researcher
Olga Lyashevska is software engineer at the Netherlands e-Science Center. She works on the first subproject of the PORN-TYPES project, using various topic modelling techniques to explore gendered, ethnic, and racial stereotypes in online pornography. In particular, she applies bipartite graph analysis to analyze the structure of graphs formed by pornographic content and associated metadata, including viewer demographics and engagement metrics, so as to uncover latent patterns of stereotype prevalence and consumption.
Postdoctoral researcher
Michael Rojek-Giffin is a postdoctoral researcher in sociology at Erasmus University Rotterdam. He obtained a PhD (cum laude) in psychology/neuroscience from Leiden University. His research explores how humans learn the unwritten rules of social conduct at the behavioral, computational, and neural level. Currently he is examining the stereotypes that exist in and spread through mainstream pornography, and which demographic factors predict affinity with particular stereotypes.
Researcher
Lena van de Lande is an Academic Teacher within the Sociology program at Erasmus University. She focuses on urban and cultural sociology within her teaching and research. In doing so, she mainly is specialized in conducting interviews and ethnography. Now she is part of the Erasmus Love Lab team and researches the sociology of sexual fantasy, specifically within the Lowlands Science Project ‘Pornfessions’.
PhD Researcher
Lotte Mikkers is a PhD candidate in Sociology at Erasmus University and Erasmus Love Lab. She holds an MSc in Persuasive Communication from the University of Amsterdam, with a focus on (sexual) health communication. She is skilled in various research methods, with expertise in qualitative approaches such as interviews. Her research interests span the field of sexual health, from contraceptive behavior to sexual development, and she is currently conducting her doctoral research on the role of sexual stereotypes in the lives of young people.
Trainee
Allison Bakkeren is a research trainee, joining the project from her Research Master’s in the Sociology of Culture, Media & the Arts. They previously completed studies in Graphic Design at Willem de Kooning Academy and Arts and Culture Studies at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Their traineeship centers on applying a multimodal approach to examine ethno-racial and gendered stereotypes in online pornographic videos, and the digital environment in which these videos are hosted and viewed.