Prevalence of sexting among students in selected secondary schools in Southwestern Nigeria

Abstract

This study focused on the prevalence of sexting among secondary school students in southwestern Nigeria with the aim of measuring the extent of using mobile phone to send or receive sexy message or nude picture among themselves. The population for this study were mobile phone users among secondary school students. A total of 350 students were sample for this study using accidental sampling technique. Four secondary schools in Osun (Oduduwa College and Anglican Central Middle school) and Ekiti (Ayeigbaju Grammar school, Ayeigbaju and Oye Egbo High school, Oye-Ekiti) states were used for this study. The choice of the schools in the two States was simply because important information on the subject matter was also obtained. The descriptive study will use structured questionnaire to elicit data for this study. The quantitative data was analysed using descriptive analysis. Findings showed that 97.4% of the students were still using mobile phone and mostly for academic work, social media and interaction and pornography among others. The use of mobile phones for sending sexy messages and nude pictures among themselves should also be in the increase. Also, the use of mobile phones for sexting is expected to have some negative effects on the education of the students. The study concluded that secondary schools management and Parents Teachers Association (PTA) must do all things to ensure that students/children use mobile phones when they are more mature and it should be used for the purpose that will be beneficial to them.

Keywords: Sexting, Mobile phone, ICT,