The Influence of Social Media on the Prevalence of Sexual Harassment among Teenagers: A Case Study of Secondary Schools in Kandara Sub-County, Kenya

Social media use by teenagers in secondary schools is on the increase with more and more students accessing face book, twitter, You-tube, email and other social sites. Whereas students use such social networking positively, the amount of time spent on the sites that consume academic time has resulted to alarming poor performance which research has associated with lack of adequate revision time, inadequate sleep amounting to poor concentration, and truancy in schools. Sexual harassment is on the increase, defiant sexual behaviors which include: lesbianism, homosexuality, multiple sexual partners and rapes amongst the students are on the increase due to sharing of pornographic images. Research has reported online sex where teenagers engage in sex with their partners on the screens through fantasy. Descriptive case study design was used to investigate from the respondents how their social media use has led to sexual harassment and consequently poor grades. This lowers a country’s production due to under skilled workers and unemployment heightening insecurity. The study was to establish how the respondents’ engagement in sexual immorality had been modeled by social media by their being primary or secondary consumers of the various sites. Simple random sampling was used in selection of 13 schools and a sample size of 320 respondents based on the school population. Social Norms Theory was used as the theoretical framework to explain the variables used in the research. Recommendations to parents, teachers and the Ministry of Education were provided as a call to all to reinforce useful utilization of social media by the teenagers and appropriate measures to curb sexual harassment in schools.