Sexting Motivation Scale (EMS) in Peruvian Youth

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article in question addresses a pertinent and current issue, which is why this work is relevant at a scientific and social level.

The introduction begins by providing a good overview of the impact of digital media and, in particular, sexting, including interesting statistics. Various consequences that can arise from sexting are also presented, highlighting the importance of deepening knowledge on this topic. The central concept of the manuscript - motivation for sexting - is well presented and made clear at the end of the introduction, for a good understanding of what comes next.

In the methodology chapter, an important question arises for me. Until then, the motivations on the part of teenagers and young adults are mentioned. However, in the sample described in point 2.2 (for both the EFA and CFA), the youngest participants are 17 years old. In this context, it doesn't make much sense for me to talk about teenagers... Also in this section, it seems to me that sentences are written that are too long, making it difficult to continue reading. Additionally, in the method, I believe that points 2.3.2 and 2.3.3 should be 2.4 and 2.5, respectively, since their content does not fit the description of the instrument. Point 2.3.1. it also seems short to me, not mentioning the items, for example.

In the results, on line 194, it mentions the double factorial loadings of item 14, but this cannot be found anywhere...

In the discussion, the sentence starting in line 229 is poorly formulated, so it should be revised.

Throughout the manuscript, some changes could also be seen, namely modifying some sentences so that there are no paragraphs made up of just one sentence.

Despite the suggestions for improvement made, the manuscript presented is of high value and the authors are to be congratulated.

Author Response

Ref.: Manuscript ID: sexes-3334818

Sexting Motivation Scale (EMS) in Peruvian Youth

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you very much for your informed comments, which helped us so much in improving the manuscript. We appreciated the time you spent doing this and tried our best to address all your comments.

We hope that this revised version of the paper reaches the expected standard, worthy of publication in this journal.

Below is a detailed list of the responses to your comments and suggestions, as well as the new version with the modifications in red font.

 

Many thanks for your time.

 

Best regards,

 

 

In the methodology chapter, an important question arises for me. Until then, the motivations on the part of teenagers and young adults are mentioned. However, in the sample described in point 2.2 (for both the EFA and CFA), the youngest participants are 17 years old. In this context, it doesn't make much sense for me to talk about teenagers	Thank you for your comment. In lines 134-136 the minimum age support has been considered.
Also in this section, it seems to me that sentences are written that are too long, making it difficult to continue reading. Additionally, in the method, I believe that points 2.3.2 and 2.3.3 should be 2.4 and 2.5, respectively, since their content does not fit the description of the instrument.	Thanks for the comment, it has been corrected in lines 150 and 183.
Point 2.3.1. it also seems short to me, not mentioning the items, for example.	Thank you for your comment, some specifications of the questionnaire have been detailed, you can see it on lines 145-149. In addition, Annex A where the questionnaire is attached with the details of its indicators has been increased, you can see it in lines 356.
In the results, on line 194, it mentions the double factorial loadings of item 14, but this cannot be found anywhere…	At the time of the elimination of items, it was eliminated little by little, while some items were eliminated, other items presented double loads, and that was happening while the process was being done, due to the number of tables, it has not been included.
In the discussion, the sentence starting in line 229 is poorly formulated, so it should be revised.	Thanks for the comment, some terms have been reworded. You can see it in lines 272-277.
Throughout the manuscript, some changes could also be seen, namely modifying some sentences so that there are no paragraphs made up of just one sentence.	Thank you for your comment, some paragraphs have been reworded.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors have proposed excellent work, and the paper in my opinion is not only in line with the goals of the journal but adds interesting data not only for the Peruvian context but also for the international literature.
In my opinion, the authors could conduct a minor revision of the manuscript following these points:

1) indicate which relational needs tend to be met through social media and which social media are most prevalent in the target population. For example, Higly visual social media are more prevalent than other social media characterized by text (ex: Facebook).
2) In my opinion, they should better equip themselves with a theoretical framework: e.g., what is the link between motivation and subsequent action? and based on what theories?
3) Better clarify whether sexting is a normative phenomenon or not, and why. And what orientation exists in this in Peruvian public opinion (if any research exists).
4) I think the sample is adequate but the fact that it is only college and university students from private universities is a limitation that should be more discussed.
5) discuss more the limitations of the research, future directions and practical implications of the study.

Suggested bibliography (not mandatory!):

  Fabris, M. A., Settanni, M., Longobardi, C., & Marengo, D. (2023). Sense of Belonging at School and on social media in Adolescence: Associations with Educational Achievement and Psychosocial Maladjustment. Child Psychiatry & Human Development, 1-14.   Longobardi, C., Badenes-Ribera, L., Mastrokoukou, S., & Fabris, M. A. (2023). Attitude toward Sexual Consent and Sext Dissemination Perpetration: The Mediating Role of the Empathy. American Journal of Sexuality Education, 1-22.

Author Response

Ref.: Manuscript ID: sexes-3334818

Sexting Motivation Scale (EMS) in Peruvian Youth

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you very much for your informed comments, which helped us so much in improving the manuscript. We appreciated the time you spent doing this and tried our best to address all your comments.

We hope that this revised version of the paper reaches the expected standard, worthy of publication in this journal.

Below is a detailed list of the responses to your comments and suggestions, as well as the new version with the modifications in blue font.

 

Many thanks for your time.

 

Best regards,

 

Indicate which relational needs tend to be met through social media and which social media are most prevalent in the target population. For example, Higly visual social media are more prevalent than other social media characterized by text (ex: Facebook).	Thanks for the comment, this has been considered in lines 97-123.
In my opinion, they should better equip themselves with a theoretical framework: e.g., what is the link between motivation and subsequent action? and based on what theories?	Through observation, the theoretical framework was strengthened by incorporating Deci and Ryan's Self-Determination Theory and Vroom's Expectancy Theory, explaining how motivation influences action. In addition, empirical studies were added to support this relationship (Lines 73-92 ).
Better clarify whether sexting is a normative phenomenon or not, and why. And what orientation exists in this in Peruvian public opinion (if any research exists).	Thanks for the comment, it has been specified in lines 46-53.
I think the sample is adequate but the fact that it is only college and university students from private universities is a limitation that should be more discussed.	In the paper it has been stated that the participants were from public and private universities, for confirmation you can check line 138 and 139.
Discuss more the limitations of the research, future directions and practical implications of the study.	Thank you for the observation, more details have been added to the discussions. You can see it from line 269 to 332.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I would like to thank the authors and the Editorial Board for the opportunity to review the article submitted to MDPI’s Sexes. The authors' manuscript refers to a very important topic: the psychometric properties of Sexting Motivation Scale.

As a psychologist and sexologist myself, I find this topic very interesting and of high important in nowadays research. The presented manuscript has various strengths, e.g. high sample size in the second study, an updated literature review or underlining the theoretical (but unfortunately, not practical) existence of the internal and external motivations for sexual behaviour. As every research project, the presented study and its manuscript are not free of limitations. Below I present my suggestions for minor and major changes in particular parts of the authors’ manuscript.

 

1.       Introduction: The definition of sexting in lines 37-39 is not fully correct. The authors claim that sexting can be defined as “sharing messages through social media containing photos or videos showing explicit sexual content” – if the individuals share them via SMS and non-social media platform messages, they are also considered sexting. I  suggest removing the “social media” part form the presented definition, since “sexting” via e.g. e-mails, is also considered sexting behaviour. For example, Madigan et al. (2018) define sexting as “the sharing of sexually explicit images, videos, or messages through electronic means”, which is more correct.

Madigan, S., Ly, A., Rash, C. L., Van Ouytsel, J., & Temple, J. R. (2018). Prevalence of multiple forms of sexting behavior among youth: A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Pediatrics, 172(4), 327-335.

 

2.       Participants: the authors did not calculate the required sample size a priori, which is not in-line with current recommendations for scientific research. EFA only included 331 university students. Outside the non-representativeness of this sample, the authors did not test if the presented sample size has sufficient statistical power which will lead to reliable conclusions. The presented sample size is not in line with current “rule of thumb” calculations which state that N=400 is usually required for factor analysis (see Hair et al., 2019). I believe that the authors have to justify the presented sample size of 331 students using the sensitivity power analysis (not post-hoc analysis; see Lakens, 2022). The KMO and Barlett’s test does not justify that.

Hair, J. F., Black, W. C., Babin, B. J., Anderson, R. E. (2019). Multivariate data analysis. Cengage Learning EMEA.

Lakens, D. (2022). Sample size justification. Collabra: psychology, 8(1), 33267.

 

 

3.       Instruments: the authors write that “Sexting Motivation Scale measures the motivations perceived by population (…)”. This suggest that EMS was published before, and they authors manuscript presents only its Peruvian adaptation. The whole manuscript suggest otherwise, that EMS was invented by the authors of the reviewed article. It should be clearly stated that EMS was constructed for the purpose of this study.

4.       Results of the CFA: please state if any or none error covariances were established in order to boost the model fit coefficients.

5.       Results overall: the authors calculate the value of McDonald’s omega instead of Cronbach’s alpha, which is less biased than alpha. I highly suggest which McDonalds’ omega was calculated: total or hierarchical, since there are multiple reliability coefficients suggested by McDonald – I believe that the authors calculated the values of total omega.

6.       Results overall: the authors did not test the obtained factor structure in bigger detail. Once again, I suggest that the authors refer to Hair et al. (2019) recommendations. The obtained structure should be tested via the measurement invariance analysis on construct, metric and scalar levels – it is unknown if the obtained model is universal, and it should be tested in multi-group CFA analysis which would include the tested sociodemographic data.

7.       Overall: The authors write (lines 77-79) that “the factors that lead to sexting need to be investigated”. since the authors obtained factor structed is one-dimensional, their research need was not satisfied. The fact that both internal and external factors build one factor is a limitation, because it is unknown which type of motivation is more important in tested individuals – by using EMS, we will obtain one summary score which is not informative enough. The authors also write in lines 212-213 that “it is worth noting that, despite being one-dimensional, the instrument includes indicators that measure internal and external factors”. In the Model 2, the number of items measuring internal and external motivations are not the same: only 1 item measures external motivation (item number 16), and 7 items measure internal motivation, therefore, the overall score may depend solely on the internal motivation which is more strongly represented in the scale questions. Therefore, the results can lead to highly biased conclusions. It is unknown what was the sound of all used items, because the authors do not share them in the manuscript and/or appendix. Therefore it is impossible which out of 8 final items is item number 16. The obtained scale is problematic also form the semantic point of view. They authors excluded two factors (internal and external motivation) based on the EFA’s results. If we analyse the scale presented in the appendix we can conclude, that all items refer solely to the internal motivation, since they refer to one’s feeling and perception, and not the outside’s pressure (the items referring to environment or partner can be also classified as parts of the internal motivation, because they are related to one’s cognitive processes). Therefore I fail to see that “instrument includes indicators that measure internal and external factors” – in my opinion, it measures only internal motives.

8.       Ethics: the manuscript’s body and information under the whole manuscript do not state if the presented study was accepted by any Institutional Bioethics Committee. If the ethical approval was not received, the presented study should cannot be published.

Author Response

Ref.: Manuscript ID: sexes-3334818

Sexting Motivation Scale (EMS) in Peruvian Youth

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you very much for your informed comments, which helped us so much in improving the manuscript. We appreciated the time you spent doing this and tried our best to address all your comments.

We hope that this revised version of the paper reaches the expected standard, worthy of publication in this journal.

Below is a detailed list of the responses to your comments and suggestions, as well as the new version with the modifications in green font.

 

Many thanks for your time.

 

Best regards,

 

 

Introduction: The definition of sexting in lines 37-39 is not fully correct. The authors claim that sexting can be defined as “sharing messages through social media containing photos or videos showing explicit sexual content” – if the individuals share them via SMS and non-social media platform messages, they are also considered sexting. I suggest removing the “social media” part form the presented definition, since “sexting” via e.g. e-mails, is also considered sexting behaviour. For example, Madigan et al. (2018) define sexting as “the sharing of sexually explicit images, videos, or messages through electronic means”, which is more correct. Madigan, S., Ly, A., Rash, C. L., Van Ouytsel, J., & Temple, J. R. (2018). Prevalence of multiple forms of sexting behavior among youth: A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Pediatrics, 172(4), 327-335.	Thanks for the comment, the text has been improved. You can see it in lines 35-37
Participants: the authors did not calculate the required sample size a priori, which is not in-line with current recommendations for scientific research. EFA only included 331 university students. Outside the non-representativeness of this sample, the authors did not test if the presented sample size has sufficient statistical power which will lead to reliable conclusions. The presented sample size is not in line with current “rule of thumb” calculations which state that N=400 is usually required for factor analysis (see Hair et al., 2019). I believe that the authors have to justify the presented sample size of 331 students using the sensitivity power analysis (not post-hoc analysis; see Lakens, 2022). The KMO and Barlett’s test does not justify that. Hair, J. F., Black, W. C., Babin, B. J., Anderson, R. E. (2019). Multivariate data analysis. Cengage Learning EMEA. Lakens, D. (2022). Sample size justification. Collabra: psychology, 8(1), 33267.	Thank you for the comment, for further support, a paragraph has been integrated to justify the number shown, you can see it in lines 174-180
Instruments: the authors write that “Sexting Motivation Scale measures the motivations perceived by population (…)”. This suggest that EMS was published before, and they authors manuscript presents only its Peruvian adaptation. The whole manuscript suggest otherwise, that EMS was invented by the authors of the reviewed article. It should be clearly stated that EMS was constructed for the purpose of this study.	Thank you for your valuable comments. Adjustments have been made to clarify that the Sexting Motivation Scale (SMS) was developed specifically for this study and is not an adaptation of a pre-existing scale (145-149).
Results of the CFA: please state if any or none error covariances were established in order to boost the model fit coefficients.	Thank you for the comment, it was clarified in the document that no error covariances were established. You can see it on line 244
Results overall: the authors calculate the value of McDonald’s omega instead of Cronbach’s alpha, which is less biased than alpha. I highly suggest which McDonalds’ omega was calculated: total or hierarchical, since there are multiple reliability coefficients suggested by McDonald – I believe that the authors calculated the values of total omega.	Thank you for your valuable comment. In line 196 it has been specified that the total mega was calculated.
Results overall: the authors did not test the obtained factor structure in bigger detail. Once again, I suggest that the authors refer to Hair et al. (2019) recommendations. The obtained structure should be tested via the measurement invariance analysis on construct, metric and scalar levels – it is unknown if the obtained model is universal, and it should be tested in multi-group CFA analysis which would include the tested sociodemographic data.	Thank you for your valuable comment, these specifications have been incorporated in the results, you can see it in lines 259-266.
Overall: The authors write (lines 77-79) that “the factors that lead to sexting need to be investigated”. since the authors obtained factor structed is one-dimensional, their research need was not satisfied. The fact that both internal and external factors build one factor is a limitation, because it is unknown which type of motivation is more important in tested individuals – by using EMS, we will obtain one summary score which is not informative enough. The authors also write in lines 212-213 that “it is worth noting that, despite being one-dimensional, the instrument includes indicators that measure internal and external factors”. In the Model 2, the number of items measuring internal and external motivations are not the same: only 1 item measures external motivation (item number 16), and 7 items measure internal motivation, therefore, the overall score may depend solely on the internal motivation which is more strongly represented in the scale questions. Therefore, the results can lead to highly biased conclusions. It is unknown what was the sound of all used items, because the authors do not share them in the manuscript and/or appendix. Therefore it is impossible which out of 8 final items is item number 16. The obtained scale is problematic also form the semantic point of view. They authors excluded two factors (internal and external motivation) based on the EFA’s results. If we analyse the scale presented in the appendix we can conclude, that all items refer solely to the internal motivation, since they refer to one’s feeling and perception, and not the outside’s pressure (the items referring to environment or partner can be also classified as parts of the internal motivation, because they are related to one’s cognitive processes). Therefore I fail to see that “instrument includes indicators that measure internal and external factors” – in my opinion, it measures only internal motives.	Thank you for the observation, for a better understanding, an additional factor has been specified that gives more light to know the practice of sexting. You can see it in lines 89-92.   As it was written in the paragraph there are indicators of internal and external motivation, since when the operationalization of the variable in the dimension of internal factors was carried out, the indicator “internal behaviors product of external stimulation” was considered and from the items that remained in the final version we have and corrected the wording of those lines (247 and 248) and ratified in line 301-302.   The final version of the instrument in line 254 has been specified in Annex 1.
Ethics: the manuscript’s body and information under the whole manuscript do not state if the presented study was accepted by any Institutional Bioethics Committee. If the ethical approval was not received, the presented study should cannot be published.	Thank you for the comment, on lines 171-173 the ethics committee approval date has been detailed.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

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