Teen sexting may be more common than you think

At least one in four teens are receivingsexually explicit texts and emails, and at least one in sevenare sending sexts, a new study suggests.

Sexting can be a healthy way for young people to exploresexuality and intimacy when it'sconsensual, said lead studyauthor Sheri Madigan of the Alberta Children's Hospital ResearchInstitute and the University of Calgary in Canada.

The troubleis that when it'scoerced, or when sexts are shared withoutpermission, it can feel a lot like cyberbullying, with many ofthe same dangerous mental health consequences.

More than one in 10 teens are forwarding these sexts withoutconsent, the study found. And roughly one in 12 teens have hadsexts they sent shared without their permission.

"Today's teens often do not separate their online andoffline lives it is all the same to them," Madigan said byemail. "This is hard for parents to grasp."

Most teens don't report sexting at all, and those who dosend or receive sexually explicit messages, videos or imagestend to be older, researchers report in JAMA Pediatrics.

Researchers examined data on sexting habits from 39previously published studies with a total of 110,380 teens.Participants were 15 years old on average, although they rangedin age from about 12 to 17.

Because kids today typically have a smartphone by the timethey're 10 years old, parents should address sexting as part ofany early conversations they have with kids about practisingsafe sex and protecting their privacy online, Madigan advised.

Think of sexting like sex

"It can be helpful for parents to think about sexting in thesame way they think about sex," said Elizabeth Englander, authorof an accompanying editorial and director of the MassachusettsAggression Reduction Center at Bridgewater State University.

Rather than forbid sexting outright, parents should beteaching children to consider the consequences of doing it andhelp kids understand how to resist pressure to do anything thatmakes them feel uncomfortable, Englander said by email.

"Youth think of adults as worriers and as over-estimatingrisk, particularly when technology is involved, and many willtune out adults who just tell them 'don't do this,'" said LisaJones, a researcher at the Crimes Against Children ResearchCenter at the University of New Hampshire in Durham.

"But sexting can be risky, and certainly nonconsensualsharing of explicit images is hurtful and even potentiallycriminal," Jones, who wasn't involved in the study, said byemail.

The study wasn't a controlled experiment designed to provewhether or how sexting might cause health problems for teens.Another drawback is that many of the smaller studies in theanalysis used different definitions of sexting that made itdifficult to determine how often teens are sharing explicitwords, videos or photos.

Still, the results emphasize the importance of frankdiscussions about safe sexting, Jones said.

"Youth need to have adults providing them with accurateinformation," Jones added. "Cautionary messages about sextingare going to be most effective if they are embedded in youtheducation on romantic relationships, treating othersrespectfully, responding to sexual pressure, and making healthydecisions about sexual behaviour."

The safest way for teens to sext is to avoid sharing anypictures they wouldn't want every person at school to see, saidDr. Matthew Davis, a researcher at the Ann & Robert H. LurieChildren's Hospital of Chicago and Northwestern UniversityFeinberg School of Medicine.

"Because sexts are permanent and so easily sent from personto person, sexts can turn a natural and usually fairly privatepart of growing up into a public and often emotionallydistressing problem," Davis, who wasn't involved in the study,said by email.

"When youth share sexually explicit photos, videos, ormessages, they put the subjects of the sexts at risk forbullying and cyberbullying and the mental health risks that canfollow," Davis added. "That's especially true when the sexts areforwarded without the subjects' permission.