Abstract:

The study examined the effects of adolescents’ exposure to sexual contents through social media in Nigeria. A quantitative structured face-to-face research approach was used in gathering data among 305 literate adolescents. They were distributed using Nigerian age-sex ratio of 51 and 49 between male and female respectively.  The study locations consist of densely populated urban areas in Lagos metropolis, Nigeria. The choice of locations was aided by the high proportion of adolescents in the areas according to the latest census figures (NPC, 2010).  One adolescent per house/building was purposively interviewed  within randomly chosen streets in the locations of study.  Data were analysed using univariate and multivariate analyses.  Common uses of social media  identified  are  facebooking,  Skyping, trading,  learning,  instagram  and  watching video/music.   The result also revealed that adolescents between the age 10 and 14 years who use social media are 4.614 times more likely to be exposed to sexual activity at P-value = 0.000. Adolescents with primary education are 26.953 times more likely to be involved in sexual activity (P-value = 0.000).  Those who possess social medial like iPhones/iPads/iPods, cable network, Smartphone, FlipCam are 4.630, 3.566, 2.682 and 6.932 more likely to be involved in  sexual activity.    The  paper  posits  that  it  is  inimical  not  to  monitor  adolescents’  exposure  to  sexual contents and censor the scenes available on social media gadgets.  The study recommends that sexuality education must be popularised in order to stem the  ravage of HIV/AIDS among the group studied.