One-Third of people have Sexted - Have you?

Here's some data to think about before sending that next picture of yourself neekeed (aka sexting): 17% of the recipients forward the image to someone else. But how many people have actually sexted?

A third of young adults have sexted at least once in their lives. Almost half of those saw it as a normal sex practice, while the rest thought it was a "serious problem" but did it anyway. You know, because if you do these things, you will eventually go blind and get pimples.

The data came from MTV's latest sexting survey. And that begs the question: Have you sexted*?

Sexting - sharing sexually explicit photos, videos and chat by cell phone or online - is fairly commonplace among young people, despite sometimes grim consequences for those who do it. More than a quarter of young people have been involved in sexting in some form, the poll found.

Sexting doesn't stop with teenagers. Young adults are even more likely to have sexted; one-third of them said they had been involved in sexting, compared with about one-quarter of teenagers.

Those who sent nude pictures of themselves mostly said they went to a boyfriend, girlfriend or romantic interest.

But 14 percent said they suspect the pictures were shared without permission, and they may be right: Seventeen percent of those who received naked pictures said they passed them along to someone else, often to more than just one person.

Boys were a little more likely than girls to say they received naked pictures or video of someone that had been passed around without the person's consent. Common reasons were that they thought other people would want to see, that they were showing off and that they were bored.

Girls were a little more likely to send pictures of themselves. Yet boys were more likely to say that sexting is "hot," while most girls called it "slutty."

Altogether, 10 percent said they had sent naked pictures of themselves on their cell phone or online.

The AP-MTV poll was conducted Sept. 11-22, and involved online interviews with 1,247 teenagers and adults ages 14-24. It has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.8 percentage points.

The survey was conducted by Knowledge Networks, which initially contacted people using traditional telephone and mail polling methods and followed with online interviews. People chosen for the study who had no Internet access were given it for free.