What parents and educators need to know about teens’ pornography and sexting experiences at school

By Megan K. Maas Michigan State University

Three out of four teenagers have seen online pornography—often before they even became a teenager. That’s according to a new report from Common Sense Media that examines the role pornography plays in the lives of today’s youth.

Some teens do more than just watch pornography. By way of “sexting,” teenagers are also creating and sending their own images and videos of themselves in the nude.

For the most part, it’s not the job of school staff to worry about what kids are looking at on the internet or sending over their phones. However, as an expert on human development—and as one who studies adolescent sexuality—I believe parents and educators should be prepared to address potential issues that might arise as a result of students’ engagement with pornography and sexting. This sort of preparedness is especially pertinent today because smartphones enable kids to look at porn and to sext during school hours. Here are five things that parents and educators should know as pornography use and sexting become more commonplace among students:

1. PORNOGRAPHY IS NOT WHAT IT USED TO BE. Fifty-two percent of teens have seen violent pornography. This includes acts such as choking, slapping, gagging, hitting and crying. This is because the internet changed the way pornography is distributed. There used to be more regulations on violent content and age verification to adhere to payper-view standards in hotel rooms and DVD sales. Now, self-produced and distributed content reigns on “tube-site” platforms that function similarly to YouTube.

Tube sites like PornHub allow for users to freely view and upload their own content. At its inception, many users assumed it was primarily “amateur content” or homemade and consensual content. However, one study showed that 1 in 8 titles of videos on the website described sexual violence. An investigation by the BBC and New York Times was prompted by victims who learned that video footage of their sexual assaults was being freely viewed on the website. The investigation uncovered millions of videos of suspected abuse and coercion, causing credit card companies to cut ties.

OnlyFans, another tube-site platform composed of user-uploaded content, also facilitates camming, or live sexual interaction, with content creators for a fee. Although there does not appear to be peerreviewed research on adolescents’ use of OnlyFans, there are some reports that minors are bypassing age verification and selling their own sexually explicit images on the platform.

2. PORNOGRAPHY IS A SOURCE OF SEX EDUCATION FOR TEENS. Without widespread comprehensive sex education in the US, young adults have identified pornography as a primary source of sex education. However, the pornography that teens have the easiest access to—tube-site pornography— tends to portray more sexual aggression, degradation of women and people of color, and lack of sexual consent.

For example, choking or strangulation during sex has been increasing in porn. This is concerning to