Digital sexual identities: Between empowerment and disempowerment

Abstract

In the digital age, people increasingly explore and express their sexual identities online. The management and development of digital sexual identities can provide opportunities of empowerment on the individual, interpersonal, and societal level. At the same time, social media users are confronted with risks of sexual disempowerment in terms of identity de-validation, social exclusion, discrimination or even criminalization. The review article summarizes the current state of research on six selected sexual identities: (1) heterosexual, (2) LGBTIQ+, (3) asexual, (4) kink and fetish, (5) polyamory, and (6) sex worker identities in digital contexts. Covering a variety of social media platforms and cultural backgrounds, the review demonstrates that digital sexual identities are best understood as multifaceted socio-technical phenomena with ambivalent outcomes.

Keywords: Digital identity; Digital platforms; Identity development; Identity exploration; Identity expression; Identity management; Internet; Sexual identity; Social media.