Young people are sexting – but that doesn’t mean they necessarily want to be, says research

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relationships, sexting, young people

Young people are sexting – but that doesn’t mean they necessarily want to be, says research

With the rise of smartphones and Snapchat, sexting is in vogue – but a new study has found that many young people engage in the practice without really wanting to.

More than half (52.3 per cent) of young adults have engaged in “ unwanted but consensual sexting with a committed partner”, according to research to be published in February in the journal Computers in Human Behaviour.

Most did so for flirtation, foreplay, to fulfil a partner’s needs, or for intimacy, but women were more likely to consent to unwanted sexting because of anxieties about their relationships.

The research, which was carried out by scientists at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI), polled 155 undergraduates in committed relationships on their sexting habits.

Fifty-five per cent of the female respondents said they had previously engaged in unwanted sexting, while 48 per cent of men had done the same.

The results show similarities between sexual behaviour online and off: in both cases, couples will willingly go along with sex, even when they do not feel like it, from reasons ranging from satisfying their partner to avoiding an argument.

But while women are often considered to engage in unwanted sex more than men, the research shows only a small difference in the number of men and women partaking in unwanted sexting.

The authors of the article argued “gender-role expectations” could be to blame. Men might be more likely to agree to undesired sexting because doing so is “relatively easy and does not require them to invest more into the relationship,” while women might be discouraged from virtual sex because it fails to help them attain their relationship “goals”.

The survey also showed that people who were anxious about their relationships were more likely to send begrudging sexts, in a bid to alleviate fears about alienation or abandonment by their partners.

Teachers To Be Given ‘Sexting’ Curb Guide

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Bullying, CEOP, guidance, images, internet, mobile phones, online safety, peer pressure, resources, school, sexting, support, teachers, Teens, young people

Teachers To Be Given ‘Sexting’ Curb Guide

Teachers are to be issued with a guide on how to deal with ‘sexting’ – the sharing of explicit photos or videos through mobile phones and the internet.

Amid a rise in pupils sending sexually explicit pictures, the advice pack, which is launched on Wednesday, offers tips on how to support a child whose image has been shared and whether the devices used should be searched.

A study by the NSPCC last year reported up to 40% of young people had been involved in ‘sexting’, and found teenage girls in particular were facing pressure from classmates to provide sexually explicit pictures of themselves.

Russell Hobby, general secretary of the National Association of Headteachers, welcomed the guidance.

He said: “The problem of ‘sexting’ – and the exposure of children to pornographic images through mobile devices – poses real and serious challenges for parents, head teachers and school staff.

“It exemplifies the way technology blurs the boundaries between school life and the wider world.”

The brochure – titled Sexting in schools: advice and support around self-generated images – will complement other resources already available to teachers, including ‘So You Got Naked Online’, produced last year by the South West Grid for Learning Trust.

Peter Davies, chief executive of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) Centre, which helped develop the new document, said: “There are very real risks with this activity by young people, from bullying to the sharing of these images among sex offenders.”

The CEOP had seen an increase in young people sharing sexual images and videos of themselves with their peer group, he said.

Last October, the Internet Watch Foundation found that 88% of self-generated, sexually explicit online content of young people had been taken from its original location and uploaded onto other websites.

Statistics from the children’s charity Beatbullying suggested 38% of young people have received a sexually explicit text or email, while 25% have received a sexual image they found offensive.

Research by the charity also suggested over half of teachers (54%) knew pupils were creating and sharing explicit material of themselves.

The newly-published guidance was developed by the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, a child protection charity, Securus Software, which provides online safety systems to over 3,200 schools, and Medway Council, whose existing advice for Kent schools was incorporated into the recommendations.

The Department of Education and the National Association of Headteachers also supported the development of the resource.

The pack will include advice to teachers about how to respond if a child tells them about ‘sexting’ they have been involved in, as well as how to handle explicit images, manage student reaction and prevent further incidents.

Case studies in the document highlight the devastating impact the sharing of explicit images can have on children’s lives and the challenges faced by schools in dealing with it.

Children are ‘upset’ by online violence, study finds

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abuse, behaviour, Children, Cyberbullying, family, internet, sexting, social media, social networks, violence, young people

Children are ‘upset’ by online violence, study finds

Children are as upset by violent videos on YouTube that feature animal cruelty or beheadings and by insensitive Facebook messages from divorced parents as they are by online bullying and pornography, according to the biggest survey of young British people and their internet use.

The research will be unveiled by the UK Council for Child Internet Safety (UKCCIS) on Tuesday – the 10th annual Safer Internet Day – when a charter of rights and responsibilities for children online will also be launched. The findings suggest that government policy, spearheaded by David Cameron, to block sexual content and pornography through parental controls and filters via internet service providers only goes part of the way to securing the online safety of children.

The survey, conducted for the council by academics, asked 24,000 children 25 questions about internet use, including “have you ever seen anything online that has upset you?” Hundreds of schools around Britain were enlisted to help canvass the children, who were aged up to 16.

Andy Phippen, professor of social responsibility at Plymouth University, who helped to devise the report, said: “Upset is caused by a broad range of issues, very varied, and not all sexual content.” One memorable answer from a primary school child who was asked what most upset him was “when my Dad told me on Facebook he didn’t want to see me any more”.

The report, Have Your Say, is consistent with research Phippen was already carrying out. The examples he heard included: a video of a zebra being killed, “someone swearing at me”, “a picture of my baby brother, who I don’t live with any more”, and a picture of a cat that “looked like my pet that had to be put down”.

Phippen said: “There is no silver bullet to crack child safety online. Government’s obsession with filtering is OK, but too narrow.”

Sonia Livingstone, professor of social psychology at the London School of Economics, told the Oxford Media Convention last month that LSE research, which asked 8,000 children aged nine to 16 about the disturbing things they had seen on the internet, supported this picture. She added: “There is a lot of attention given to pornography and bullying on social media, but they also mentioned beheadings, flaying, cruelty to animals.”

Professor Phippen agreed: “Any channel used for communication is potentially a channel for upsetting content, but certainly YouTube is the most prevalent as far as video content is concerned.”

Livingstone said that the issue of online bullying was not covered by efforts to filter out inappropriate content. “Filtering is only about content on established websites”, while filtering and blocking controls could be very clunky to use and problematic.

However, Have Your Say also finds many positive aspects to the internet. The survey shows that what under-11s do most is play games on sites such as Moshi Monsters, followed by schoolwork and keeping in touch with friends. For older children, social networking takes over from playing games.

“I think, in this age group, violent images and upset from abusive nasty comments from their peers are the concerns. It is spoken about as so and so is so mean to me. Cyber bullying – they don’t use that term,” said Phippen. Evidence from the children of being groomed or facing predatory behaviour online is also scanty.

Accessing pornography online, the main concern of parents responding to a government consultation last autumn, did not feature highly in the teenagers’ responses. But there is a growing problem of “sexting” messages in school, when pupils share personal sexual content via smartphones and tablets. Phippen said one answer was better education. “You come back to media literacy. About understanding how to conduct yourself online and what the impact can be of behaviour, when you don’t see the impact of your behaviour, on the victim in front of you.”

NSPCC: A qualitative study of children, young people and ‘sexting’

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Children, sexting, young people

NSPCC: A qualitative study of children, young people and ‘sexting’

MPs to debate the growing problem of young girls being pressurised into ‘sexting’

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sexting

MPs to debate the growing problem of young girls being pressurised into ‘sexting’

A teenage girl sends a naked image of herself to her boyfriend’s mobile phone. It’s not something she makes a habit of doing, but she wants to express the young couple’s intimacy. They split up, and she soon discovers that he has circulated that private message to all his friends – even to her parents – with a few button clicks.

Her story, told by Richard Piggin, deputy chief executive of charity Beatbullying, is one of many.

“Sexting” – the peer-to-peer sharing of explicit images – is increasingly common among young people, but can be anything but harmless fun. Amid growing concern from parents and campaigners, one MP will today demand that mobile phone companies do more to educate them about the potential dangers of this most modern method of flirting.

Ann Coffey, the Labour MP for Stockport, has tabled a motion set to be heard this morning. Drawing parallels with alcohol and gambling industry-funded advertising campaigns about the safe use of their products, she will demand that companies fund advice for teenagers.

She is pushing for “sexting” information leaflets to be provided with new mobile phones and wants the industry to pay for TV and press advertising, and to promote ChildLine. Mrs Coffey will say that the leaflet should “explain how, at the click of a button an image intended for private use, can lead to public humiliation and even fall into the hands of sophisticated sexual predators”.

The move follows the report by an independent parliamentary inquiry into online child protection, published last week, in which MPs wrote that “sexting” was of “great concern” to parents.

The problem is growing, according to Beatbullying, which carried out a survey in 2009 that showed 38 per cent of children aged 11-18 had received a sexually explicit or distressing text or email.

“The research back in 2009 uncovered for the first time the sorts of things young people were doing and the worrying nature of it,” said Mr Piggin, “but it is concerning that young people are finding it increasingly normal”.

This view is backed by research at Plymouth University which found that 40 per cent of 14 to 16-year-olds said their friends engaged in “sexting”. Research by Andy Phippen, professor of social responsibility in IT, found that 40 per cent of teenagers saw nothing wrong with a topless image and 15 per cent had no problem with naked images.

All organisations agree that criminalising those involved is not viable, but that education is the only path. A majority of teachers are aware of the problem, said Jon Baggaley, of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, but the young people “didn’t realise that adults knew this was going on” and they were able to discuss this.

Sexting by numbers

38 per cent The number of teenagers who have received a sexually explicit text or email.

27 per cent The percentage of young people who said sexting happens regularly or all the time.

1 in 4 Teenagers have received an offensive sexual image.

Figures from Beatbullying and Plymouth University