The sending and receiving of sexually explicit cell phone photos (“Sexting”) while in high school: One college’s students’ retrospective reports

• Previous reports of prevalence rates of sexting by teens vary greatly.
• We surveyed college students regarding their sexting while in high school.
• Over 19% of students acknowledged having sent nude cell phone picture of themselves.
• Over 38% reported having received a nude cell phone picture of someone else.
• Despite the psychosocial and legal risks of sexting, many teens engage in the behavior.

The sending and receiving of sexually explicit photographs via cell phone, sexting has received much publicity in the popular media and increasing attention in the scientific literature. The research is being fueled, in part, by the several potentially problematic psychosocial and legal consequences of sexting, particularly when the person pictured in the photograph is a minor. Despite the surveys (those published in peer-reviewed journals and elsewhere) that have been conducted, their methodological limits have left us without a clear sense of even how many male and female teens are sending, receiving, and forwarding these sexually explicit photos via cell phone. The present study surveyed over 1100 undergraduate students from a single university regarding their experience with sexting while in high school. Results revealed that over 19% of the students reported having sent nude picture of themselves to others via cell phone (i.e., sexting), over 38% reported having received such a picture from someone else, and nearly 7% admitted to having forwarded such a picture to one or more others. Sex differences regarding sexting as well as its targets and its relationship to religiosity were also explored.

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