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Alexia Bailey

Professor Cassel

English 1201

1 May 2019

What Are the Effects of Sexting?

Before my freshman year of high school, I decided to switch to a different school

and make new friends because I was tired of the bullying. The switch went well, I did

end up making new friends, but they weren’t the best kind of people. One of them

ended up going to a juvenile detention facility for two months and another would break

into cars. Obviously not the best crowd, so I tried to separate from them and talk to

other people. I met someone we are just going to call Jake. Jake seemed nice and

welcoming at first and even became someone I talked to often. He started saying things

like “I’m feeling sad today, can you send me a picture of your boobs to make me feel

better?” I refused many times but didn’t want to lose a friend, so I eventually gave in

after a few months and sent him a picture of my chest. This picture was then posted on

Instagram and ruined my freshman year of high school. After that, I became an angry

and not trusting person.

Sexting is the act of sending and/or receiving an intimate message or picture.

Many people, from as young as thirteen years old all the way to 30 years old, send or
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receive sexts. About forty-two percent of young people say they are showing the explicit

messages or images being sent, to other people or posting them publicly, which is now

making it a social norm in today’s society. Peer pressure on its own is a major problem

because it can affect a person who really doesn’t want to do something by pressuring

them into saying “okay.” In a 2009 study conducted by the Pew Research Center,

teenagers from age twelve to seventeen said that they participated in sexting as an

experiment because they considered it to be safer than sexual intercourse, as a way to

initiate a sexual or a romantic relationship, or as the result of peer pressure.

Everything is easier when it’s on the other side of the screen. To many people,

sexting is a serious issue because people who engage in sexting can be charged with

child pornography, no matter how old you are. Even if two teenagers exchanging explicit

images back and forth between each other they can still get charged with possessing

child pornography because it is considered being in possession of minor pornography/

underage nude images.

Teen suicide rates have actually increased because of harassment and

embarrassment that can be caused by sexting. A study and evaluation done by the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that in 2015, the suicide rate in

teenage girls between the ages fifteen to nineteen had doubled and even the suicide

rates for boys in the same age group had risen by thirty percent. Sexting isn’t the only

problem for this, social media also has a big part to play.
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One reason that sexting may be positive is that teens experiment sexually more

online now, rather than person-to-person. They may not be the case for all teens, but

the majority just talk to others romantically online. It’s safer in the sense that no

pregnancies can accidentally happen with teenagers. There’s also a zero percent

chance of getting any sexually transmitted disease when being intimate with someone

online.

Attached below is a more recent chart that shows the suicide rates in 2017.

Although, and thankfully, the percentages are low, it obviously shows that men are more

likely to commit suicide than women.

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What could potentially prevent or lower the suicide rates in young people is to

stop/limit sexting, especially casual sexting. The sharing of an explicit image can easily

make someone feel uncomfortable, ashamed, and embarrassed. These feelings, along

with peer judgment or harassment, can lead to depression.Younger people are less

likely to have control over their emotions, which can create more problems than there

actually are. An intimate image or text meant for only one person can be publicized and

the sender can be ostracized and harassed about it. Harassment from peers can lead to

heavily depressive thoughts of suicide and sometimes people act on those thoughts.

When a nude image is sent, the sender can never get that back. If the receiver

harbors malicious feelings toward the sender, then they could post the image on social

media saying harsh things or they could share it with a group of friends, maybe with

people around the school, and still say harsh things. The image can be used as a sort of

“sextortion” object. This means that the receiver could blackmail the sender and say

something like “if you don't do this (whatever the receiver wants) for me, then I will post

this everywhere” or “I need this amount of money, then I will delete your picture.” When

or if this situation ever arises, contact your local police department, and they can help

you deal with the issue at hand.

Social media is another issue to address that relates to sexting. Snapchat, a very

popular form of social media among teens today, was originally created for the purpose

of sending nude images in a quick and supposedly “safe” way. With snapchat, the time

a person is able to see an image you send can be controlled, which gives people a
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sense of relief. There’s a downside to this though. The person receiving the sext can

still take a screenshot of the image before it disappears. Parents are unable to control

what their teenagers are sending and who they are talking/sending things to. Teens use

snapchat because of the sense of privacy they feel when using it since parents are

unable to limit anything involving the app. The main reason sexting has spread across

snapchat more so than other social media is to escape their parents' control. Sexting

also creates something called “moral panic.” Moral panic is the “fear of a new

technology’s or cultural form’s negative impact outside of parental control.” Snapchat is

something that has, over the years, created many moral panics.

The number of teenagers who participate in sexting is actively increasing every

month, not year, but month. Sexting is a way for teenagers to feel accepted. They like

the positive feedback from people, it’s a confidence booster. It doesn’t sound that bad,

right? Well, the attention they get has a negative impact also. The person who sends

the sext’s peers begin to formulate negative opinions about them, but they don’t realize

it, bringing negative attention and feedback to the sender.

Another positive reason is that, in a relationship, sexting can actually help said

relationship to become more pleasing. In 2015, 870 volunteers were randomly surveyed

ages eighteen to eighty-two shows that three-fourths of the participants said they had

sexted in the context of a committed relationship, while less than half said they had

participated in sexting in a casual relationship. Sexters tended to have a higher

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satisfaction rate in their relationships, which are serious ones, and are “very committed”,

(Dockrill) in which case no rise in relationship satisfaction was clear.

Sexting amongst teens has become their way of sexually engaging with one

another. Although there is much research done on the topic of sexting. Due to the fact

that teenagers would need their parents’ permission to engage and participate in any

experiment that involves sexting, there is minimal professionally set up experiments

conducted on the topic. Sexting can be associated with not only teenagers but young

adults as well.

In a study done in 2012 by Deborah Gordon-Messer, MPH., Jose Arturo

Bauermeister, MPH, PhD., Alison Grodzinski, MLIS., and Marc Zimmerman, PhD.,

many credible sources. They took a sample of young adults from the ages of eighteen

to twenty-four and categorized them into four different categories. Category one is the

non-sexters. Category two is the receivers. Category three is the senders, and category

four is the two-way sexters (a person who both sends and receives sexts). They then

observe the relationships between the four categories and came up with their results.

About 57 percent, over half, of the participants are non-sexters, 28.2 percent are two-

way sexters, 12.6 percent are receivers, and finally, 2 percent are senders.

They found no relationship between sexting and mental well-being. So, they

conclude that sexting is not at all related to any sexual risks, sexual behaviors, or

mental well-being.
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Young adults, as well as with any age group, when being coerced into sending

nude images and receiving unwanted sexts can create problems of anxiety, depression,

and stress symptoms. Nobody likes to be pressured into doing something they don’t

want to do, which can be illegal in some instances.

Sexting, overall, is something that should statistically be avoided at all costs, but

with the way the future is going, that is most likely impossible. Although there are many

sad and unnecessary things that happen because of sexting, it can be used in a good

way in a serious relationship, when trying to spice things up. It can also be beneficial in

the way that the people who are sexting have less of a risk of getting STD’s. There is no

way to erase sexting from existence because of today’s culture and society.

Sexting is becoming a part of a teenager’s everyday life and when they are in a

relationship they feel like sending nude/explicit images and text messages are expected

of them. This is very unhealthy in the way that it could lead to possible early sexual

actions.

Although seeming repetitive, sexting is not something to take as a joke or to be

taken lightly because of the serious actions and/or consequences that can take place

after an explicit picture or text message is sent. Someone not sending that sext could

save them from a lot of depressive thoughts, anxiety, stress, sextortion, suicide, trouble

with the law, etc.

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Works Cited

Boyd, Hal, and Mark Butler. "Sexting and Pornography Use May Lead to Teen

Violence." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2019. Opposing

Viewpoints in Context,

http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/VBKYHC889078003/OVIC?u=dayt30401&sid

=OVIC&xid=02b134a6. Accessed 8 Apr. 2019. Originally published as

"Pornography may not cause school shootings, but the science shows it's hurting

teens an awful lot," Washington Examiner, 3 June 2018.

Carton, Sean. "Teens Sext to Experiment Sexually and Socialize Independently."

Sexting, edited by Roman Espejo, Greenhaven Press, 2015. At Issue. Opposing

Viewpoints in Context,

http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/EJ3010792222/OVIC?u=dayt30401&sid=OVI

C&xid=e160b8e3. Accessed 8 Apr. 2019. Originally published as "For Teens,

Social Media Is the New Car: Sexting Is the New Back Seat," idfive.com, 21 July

2014.

“Debate Flares over Sexting in Schools.” The Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney,

Australia), 2018. EBSCOhost,

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsgin&AN=edsgcl.56099477

8&site=eds-live.

Dockrill, Peter. “Sexting Might Be Good For Your Relationship, Study Finds.”

ScienceAlert, 10

Aug. 2015, www.sciencealert.com/sexting-might-be-good-for-your-

relationship-study-finds.
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Parenthood, Planned. “Sexting | Facts, Information and Advice On the

Consequences.” Planned Parenthood, 2019,

www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/teens/bullying-safety-privacy/all-about-

sexting.

"Sexting." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2018. Opposing

Viewpoints in Context,

http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/PC3010999058/OVIC?u=dayt30401&sid=OVI

C&xid=b29f014d. Accessed 8 Apr. 2019.