Sexting Attitudes Scales (Weisskirch & Delevi, 2011)

Attitudes towards sharing of sexual material via messaging services and phone images in children, adolescents, and young adults; 17 items, 4-8 item subscales, Ages 12-30

Populations: Children, Adolescents, Young adults
Age ranges: 12-22, 18-30
Languages: English, Spanish
Countries: Spain; United States

Items

Subscales:

Fun and Carefree
Perceived Risk
Relational Expectations

Items by Subscale:

Fun and Carefree

Sexting is just part of flirting
There is no harm in sexting
Sexting is fun
Sexting is exciting
Sexting is part of being in a relationship
Sexting is a regular part of romantic relationships nowadays
Sexting is no big deal

Perceived Risk

I think that sexting may cause me problems in the future
Sending sexually suggestive texts is risky
Sending sexually racy pictures leaves me vulnerable
Sending sexually suggestive photos or videos is risky
You have to be careful about sexting

Relational Expectations

I share the sexts I receive with my friends
I share the sexts I send with my friends
My romantic partners expect me to send sexually racy texts
My romantic partners expect me to send sexually racy photos or videos
Sexting improves my relationship or potential relationship

Responses

Items use a Likert-type scale 1 = (strongly disagree), 5 = (strongly agree)

Scoring

Higher scores indicate more positive attitudes towards sexting

Citations

Weisskirch, R. S., & Delevi, R. (2011). “Sexting” and adult romantic attachment. Computers in Human Behavior, 27(5), 1697-1701. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2011.02.008

Spanish Validation:

Rodríguez-Castro, Y., Alonso-Ruido, P., González-Fernández, A., Lameiras-Fernández, M., & Carrera-Fernández, M. V. (2017). Spanish adolescents’ attitudes towards sexting: Validation of a scale. Computers in Human Behavior, 73, 375-384. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.03.049

Scoring breakdown

Measure development

Significant design input from young people
Cognitive interviews with young people
Expert input

Validity

Unknown: Face validity
Unknown: Convergent validity
Green: Construct validity

Reliability

Green: Internal consistency
Unknown: Test-retest

Ease of use

Unknown: Readability

Definitions

Face validity: How well a measure appears to represent the construct it is supposed to be measuring.

Convergent validity: How well a measure correlates with other hypothetically-related measures.

Construct validity: The extent to which a measure reflects the construct it was designed to evaluate.

Internal consistency: The extent to which items in a scale capture aspects of the same construct.

Test-retest: The degree to which measurement scores are consistent over a short period of time (usually 2 weeks).

Readability: The ease with which a reader can understand the questionnaire items.

Key

Green: Meets validation criteria
Red: Does not meet validation criteria
Unknown: Evidence not available