The practice of creating and sharing sexual images via technological devices, known as sexting, has received crescent attention in the past years, especially due to the increase of adolescent engagement in this behavior. Although consensual sexting is not prima facie a crime, as some research has shown, it has the potential to be a risky behavior, and a threshold to get exposure to dangerous kinds of victimization as sextortion, online grooming or cyberbullying. In this context, teenagers represent a vulnerable group due to their limited ability of self-regulation, their high susceptibility to peer pressure, their technophilia, and their growing sexual curiosity. The present paper aims to review the scientific literature to analyze the relationship between mental health and sexting as a potentially risky behavior and its association with online victimization. The results and implications will be discussed.

Recent research on sexting highlighted a relationship between this new technology-mediated behavior and psychopathology correlates, although up to date results are mixed, and so far, studies have often used simple and not clinically validated measures of mental health. This study aimed to investigate sexting behaviors, online sexual victimization, and related mental health correlates using clinically validated measures for global psychopathology, anxiety, and depression; and doing so separately for men and women. The sample consisted of 1370 Spanish college students (73.6% female; 21.4 mean age; SD = 4.85) who took part in an online survey about their engagement in sexting behaviors, online sexual victimization behaviors, and psychopathological symptomatology, measured by a sexting scale and the Listado de Síntomas Breve (brief symptom checklist) (LSB-50), respectively. Out of our total sample, 37.1% of participants had created and sent their own sexual content (active sexting), 60.3% had received sexual content (passive sexting), and 35.5% had both sent and received sexual content, with significant differences between male and female engagement in passive sexting. No differences were found between men and women in the prevalence of their victimization by nonconsensual dissemination of sexual content; however, women were more pressured and threatened into sexting than men. Sex differences in psychopathology were found only for depression prevalence rates but not for global psychopathology or anxiety. Furthermore, for male participants, our results showed a significant association only between online sexual victimization and psychopathology but not for consensual active and passive sexting. However, for the female participants, active sexting, passive sexting, and online sexual victimization were all associated with poorer mental health. Implications for prevention and intervention are discussed.

Little is known about online victimization of Spanish adolescents. The present study aims to determine the past-year prevalence of online victimization in a community sample of Spanish adolescents. The final sample consisted of 3,897 adolescents between 12 and 17 years old (M=14.45, SD=1.59), 1,836 males and 2,049 females, recruited from 39 secondary schools in the east of Spain. The Cuestionario de victimización juvenil mediante internet y/o teléfono móvil (hereinafter, Juvenile Online Victimization Questionnaire, JOV-Q, Montiel & Carbonell, 2012) was applied for the assessment of eight types of online victimization grouped in two major domains: sexual (sexual coercion, sexual pressure, online grooming by an adult, unwanted exposure to sexual content and violation of privacy); and nonsexual victimization (online harassment, happy slapping, pressure to obtain personal information). Sixty-one percent of adolescents reported online victimization during the last year. Online sexual victimization was reported by 39.5% of adolescents and nonsexual victimization by 53.4% of them, whereas 31% of youth reported having experienced online victimization in both domains. The highest prevalence rates were recorded for online harassment (50%), unwanted exposure to sexual content (24.4%), pressure to obtain personal information (18.4%) and online grooming by an adult (17.2%), and the lowest for sexual coercion (6.7%) and happy slapping (2.2%). Thirty-five percent of the adolescents were considered online polyvictims and most of them experienced victimization in both sexual and nonsexual domains (88%). This study illustrates that Spanish adolescents experience high levels of online victimization and that multiple online victimization appears to be the norm among cybervictims.

There is currently no evidence of the relationship between cyber dating abuse (CDA) and health-related quality of life (HRQoL), especially from a longitudinal perspective. The objectives were: a) to analyze the point and period prevalence, incidence, and score changes over time of victimization by CDA; b) to compare HRQoL in the different categories of victims of CDA (nonvictims, new, ceased, intermittent, and stable victims). A three-wave longitudinal study was carried out over 13 months. The final sample was composed of adolescents who had a partner in the 6 months before the measurements: 341(W1), 357(W2), and 416(W3). The prevalence of CDA was 31.1% (W1), 32.8% (W2), and 18.1% (W3). The girls had higher prevalence in victimization by control than the boys in all waves. The period prevalence was 23% (20% for control, 15% for direct aggression) and the cumulative incidence was 15%. Stable victims had the lowest HRQoL scores.