Sexting’: a new cultural phenomenon?

The invention of a new term – for example, the portmanteau integration of sex and texting into the concept ‘sexting’ – may or may not identify a new phenomenon. Despite the public attention attracted by media announcements, such as those that open this chapter, it is unclear whether sexting is new and problematic or merely the latest moral panic related to youth and technology (Critcher, 2008). Although sexting is not unlike earlier telephonic, written or face-to-face exchanges (Chalfen, 2009), these quick-fire exchanges that occur largely ‘under the radar’ have been greatly enabled, perhaps transformed, by the advent of convenient, affordable, accessible and mobile access to the internet (boyd, 2008). Also, the privacy and anonymity of much online communication would seem to proliferate the possibilities for youthful sexual communication (Subrahmanyam and Šmahel, 2011).

Focus group discussions with teenagers suggest that sexting is primarily a form of electronically mediated flirtation (Lenhart, 2009). However, there have been revelations in some news stories of sexual activity among young people, made visible through the exchange of explicit, even possibly illegal images (if the images are of minors; Arcabascio, 2010; Sacco et al, 2010). Some argue that sexting is problematic only if the messages reach unintended recipients or are manipulated to produce hurtful effects, which is opening a new chapter in the history of sexual harassment (Barak, 2005; Ybarra et al, 2006). Concerns include, on the one hand, sexting as part of the much-claimed sexualisation of childhood (Greenfield, 2004) or the ‘hyper, (hetero)sexual commodification and objectification of girl's bodies’ (Ringrose, 2010, p 179) and, on the other, sexting as an activity that forms part of the abusive, usually adult-instigated, process of grooming (Davidson and Gottschalk, 2010). The boundary between what is fun and what is coercive may be difficult to distinguish, given the routine, often humorous exchange of sexual innuendo, rude jokes and swearing endemic in teenage conversation (National Campaign to Support Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, 2008; Ringrose, 2010).