Date of Defense

4-24-2026

Date of Graduation

5-2026

Department

Sociology

First Advisor

Rhonda Delong

Second Advisor

Angela Moe

Keywords

United States, social media, child trafficking, sex trafficking, minor sex trafficking, online exploitation

Abstract

This literature review focuses on how human sex traffickers utilize social media to groom children. Social media is utilized by a great number of people around the world, including many children. While social media is intended to be fun and interactive, it does provide new access for dangerous people to reach victims. There is a very real, growing issue online that is not widely known to the public. This hidden danger is known as human trafficking. Human trafficking is defined as the involvement of any force, fraud, or coercion to obtain some labor or commercial sex act (Department of Homeland Security, 2025). This review on trafficking is meant to provide facts, statistics, and resources for parents and caregivers to identify tactics used by traffickers to lure children into dangerous situations. This includes how to prepare and protect children from online dangers. Children spend much of their time online in this digital age. Knowing this, parents must be equipped with the tools and knowledge to teach their children online safety to protect them from predators.

In researching the literature on human trafficking, the question of how social media affects the trafficking of minors in the United States was raised. The literature collected focuses mostly on stranger-child relationships on social media and how child victims may be affected by it. This review dives into the past, present, and future provisions against child sex trafficking. The laws put in place regarding sex trafficking and victim protections will be briefly described, as well as laws on social media and child protection online. Through review of this information on how traffickers exploit children, changes can be made to social media sites for the goal of protecting children from traffickers. Given the lack of reporting of trafficked minors, more research needs to be done in the future on how children are affected by being trafficked to help them heal from their experiences. It is also important to continue research on how the grooming of minors occurs online to be better informed to protect them.

Access Setting

Honors Thesis-Open Access

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Criminology Commons

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