A new French study has found that more women are tuning in to porn after revealing that 82 percent of women have watched a hardcore porn film, and at least half have watched an X-rate film on their own without their partners.

Not surprisingly, men are still the predominant porn audience with 99 percent of men surveyed admitting to watching pornography.

The latest study, conducted by the IFOP polling institute in September, consisted of a total of 1,101 people ages 18 and over, with 579 being women and 522 being men.

IFOP spokesman Francois Kraus told AFP news agency that the number of female porn viewers jumped from 73 percent in 2006 and from 23 percent in 1992, according to an INSERM study on French sexuality carried out by researchers at the time.

"In the space of a few years it has become an accepted thing for women to watch pornography, partly thanks to the Internet, and video-on-demand services that made porn more accessible and took away the shame factor," Kraus told AFP.

So the question is why are more women watching porn? Researchers found that 62 percent of the women surveyed said that they wanted to spice up their sex lives.

"Women are now consuming porn by themselves," Kraus said. "That goes hand in hand with a widening of sexual behavior, and changing attitudes towards sex toys or fellatio for instance."

"And of course it raises the issue of masturbation, one of the great taboos of female sexuality. There is a real generational break, with women in their forties and younger much more willing to admit the practice," he added.

So what do women want when it comes to porn? Researchers found that 40 percent of women said that the most important thing was that the X-rate film to have a natural-looking cast and 35 percent of women and 48 percent of under 35-year-olds said that having a "realistic" sex scene was most important.

However, most people still feel that the adult entertainment industry caters only to male fantasies, with 71 percent of women and 61 percent of men sharing this sentiment.

Furthermore, 72 percent of female respondents felt like the porn films on the market were "highly degrading" to women, compared to 50 percent of men, and 57 percent of women felt like the films were too violent compared to 41 percent of men.

The survey found that women watch porn far less frequently than men, with only 5 percent of women watching frequently (at least once a month), compared to 34 percent of men.

Younger women were more likely to report being frequent porn watchers with 17 percent of women under 25 reporting watching porn at least once a week compared to only 5 percent of women over the age of 35 reporting the same.

Researchers also found that virgins were the most eager to fire up a porn film, after revealing that a third of regular porn viewers were made up of women with no sexual experience.

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