“Sex doll owners were significantly more likely to see women as sex objects, to report greater sexual entitlement, and to see women as unknowable than non-owners,” the researchers reported. They also reported lower sexual self-esteem, although they were no more or less prone to sexual aggression, fantasizing about coercive sex, or to having issues with emotion and attachment.

The findings are politically relevant, as some have proposed banning lifelike sex dolls, particularly those that resemble children, because they argue that the dolls promote pedophilia and increase sexual crimes.

To the contrary, the researchers say that their results indicate that the use of sex dolls may lower users’ risk of sexually offending. Dolls could serve as an innocuous outlet for managing sexual and relationship insecurities.