Are People Really As Stupid As NYT Break-Up Article Suggests?

You will probably have seen this “Styles” piece on the difficulties of breaking up in the digital era already. It is pretty much what you would expect: There’s plenty to mock, plenty to feel smug about, just enough to evoke a small bit of pity, etc.; you’ll all have your own favorite parts. Here’s what surprised me.

Sharing passwords to e-mail accounts, bank accounts and photo-sharing sites is the new currency of intimacy….According to the Internet and American Life Project at the Pew Research Center, one in five teenagers polled shares online passwords as a way to build trust and foster romance. Grown-ups, explained Lee Rainie, the project’s director, are exhibiting similar behavior.

Is that real? Are grown-ups really doing that? I mean, kids I get. Kids are idiots. That’s why sexting is such a fun story for everyone. But do modern-day adults really share their e-mail passwords with each other in a bid to boost trust? Man, I do not understand anything about how this new world works.