Chicago ? Porn used to be relegated to a video hidden in the bottom drawer, or a magazine under the mattress. Today, it’s part of everyday life.

The Pussycat Dolls recently hosted a prime-time television show in which scantily clad young women performed sexually charged dance routines in a quest to be the next member of the group - another sign, some say, of the way pornography is influencing popular culture.

Hugh Hefner’s girlfriends have become TV’s “girls next door.” Porn stars have MySpace pages and do voiceovers for video games. And while “porn on demand” is standard for hotel TVs and upgraded cable packages, it’s even easier to find it with a few clicks on the computer.

In April, more than a third of the U.S. Internet audience visited sites that fit into the online “adult” category, according to comScore Media Metrix.

So the message is clear: In today’s world, sex doesn’t just sell. The pervasiveness of porn has made sexiness – from subtle to raunchy – a much-sought-after attribute online, at school and even at work.

‘A poser’

Many agree that the trend has had a particularly strong influence on young women – in some cases, taking shape as an unapologetic embracing of sexuality and exhibitionism.

“I am one of those girls,” said Holly Eglinton, a 31-year-old Canadian who recently won a talent search competition to appear as an unclothed newscaster on the Internet’s “Naked News.” She auditioned after meeting a producer for the show on a social networking site where she’s posted provocative photos of herself – an increasingly common practice.

For Eglinton, taking off her clothes for an Internet audience was freeing, fun and a little rebellious.

“It’s something that sort of suits my personality,” she said. “I’m kind of an extrovert and a bit of a camera hog, a poser.”

It’s a prevalent sentiment in our look-at-me culture. But many wonder if it really is empowering, especially for younger women and girls who try to emulate what’s already on the Web.

New standard of sexy

Too often, educators and health professionals say, the results are cases of “Girls Gone Wild” – gone wild.

Michael Simon, a therapist and high school counselor in the San Francisco Bay area, has seen an increasing number of girls and young women in his private practice after episodes in which they undressed or masturbated in front of a Web cam for people they met online.

“Instead of pornography or performative sexuality being one choice among many ways of being sexual, it’s essentially become the standard of sexiness,” Simon said. “It’s also the standard by which a man or woman is a prude, depending on how much they embrace that kind of sexuality.”

There was a time when dancing for the masses in barely there outfits was the realm of music video stars and strippers. Then the Internet and reality TV came along, providing new platforms for young women to flaunt it for a shot at fame.

In one prime-time series, for instance, eager young contestants perform soft-core porn dance routines in hopes of becoming the next member of The Pussycat Dolls singing group.

Sexiness is the status quo

The fascination with being “hot” also has made its way into the workplace, where confidence is often conveyed in the way one looks and dresses.

“I would say that, in the world of Washington, D.C., power brokers, it’s important to be sexy, but in a more sophisticated, muted way,” said Charles Small, a 25-year-old young professional who works in the nation’s capital. That’s in contrast, he says, to cities such as Los Angeles and Miami, “where overt sexiness is more the status quo.”

It’s a big topic of discussion among researchers. A 2007 report from the American Psychological Association compiled the findings of myriad studies, showing that the sexualization of young women and girls, in particular, can hurt them in many ways. Problems can include anything from low self-esteem and eating disorders to depression and anxiety.

Simon, the California therapist, has seen those symptoms in several of his young female patients.

While boys tend to seek out porn for their own sexual pleasure, he sees a sexual disconnect with girls who exhibit provocative behavior they’re not ready for – from undressing online to performing oral sex on boys.

“It doesn’t have anything to do with their sexual pleasure,” Simon said. “It has to do with pleasing somebody else – the grasping for attention.

“As a parent, it makes me want to cry.”

And while they tell him they feel empowered, too often, he says they end up getting pegged as “sluts.”

Players’ club

Julie Albright, a sociologist at the University of Southern California, has noted that dynamic in her research. She’s working on a book about “players,” men who juggle more than one sex partner and earn a title of esteem for behavior that much of society still frowns upon for women.

“If you ‘act like a man,’ in that sense, you’re trying to grab hold of that same kind of power, that same kind of lifestyle – and claim male privilege,” Albright said.

“The problem is, you’re still female and it’s still a man’s world.”

Anna Stanley, a 25-year-old in Madison, Wis., knows all about that double standard. She also wonders if she and her peers place too much importance on the power of sexiness.

“It seems like it stems out of the ‘Girl Power’ thing of the ’90s gone awry – men objectify us, so let’s objectify ourselves and get something out of it. It’s not really progress,” she said. “But it’s something I have mixed feelings about – because sometimes I do it, too.

“Sometimes you do dress up to get noticed and attention, and you do feel more confident when you do that.”

She wishes there was more focus on helping women develop a healthy sense of their own sexuality.

Suicide Girls

Missy Suicide – founder of the “Suicide Girls” pinup Web site – couldn’t agree more.

“I think that women shouldn’t be afraid of their sexuality. It’s a part of who we are. You shouldn’t be embarrassed and ashamed of your body and yourself,” said the 29-year-old entrepreneur, who lives in Los Angeles. But, she says, it shouldn’t be the sole focus.

She and the women on her site are known for challenging the stereotypes of beauty, with their tattoos and piercings and varying body types.

“I get messages from girls all the time saying they never felt beautiful before because they never saw girls like themselves in magazines or on TV. Then they saw a girl like them on ‘Suicide Girls,”‘ she said of the site, an online community that attracts a worldwide audience of both admirers and women who want to become nude pinups.