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Abstract
Sextortion is the threatened dissemination of explicit, intimate, or embarrassing
images of a sexual nature without consent, usually for the purpose of procuring additional
images, sexual acts, money, or something else. Despite increased public interest in
this behavior, it has yet to be empirically examined among adolescents. The current
study fills this gap by exploring the prevalence of sextortion behaviors among a nationally
representative sample of 5,568 U.S. middle and high school students. Approximately
5% of students reported that they had been the victim of sextortion, while about 3%
admitted to threatening others who had shared an image with them in confidence. Males
and nonheterosexual youth were more likely to be targeted, and males were more likely
to target others. Moreover, youth who threatened others with sextortion were more
likely to have been victims themselves. Implications for future research, as well
as the preventive role that youth-serving professionals can play, are discussed.