Abstract
Social media content can negatively influence body esteem in young women through the idealized forms of physical appearance that are portrayed. A recent social media trend has been a growth in posting images depicting side-by-side posed and un-posed photographs showing a natural self-representation alongside an altered version of the same individual. This study investigated the effects of viewing such ‘before and after’ style social media images on young women’s mood and body dissatisfaction. Participants were 162 young women (aged 17–29 years old) who were randomly allocated to view either 15 idealized (‘fitspiration’) images, 15 ‘before and after’ comparison images, or 15 images which depicted the ‘after’ only component of the same images. Results showed that exposure to ‘before and after’ comparison images led to improved mood and reduced body dissatisfaction in young women, compared to when viewing the ‘after’ only component or fitspiration images. Exposure to fitspiration-style images and ‘after’ only images increased body dissatisfaction and negative mood. This study suggests individuals may process and respond to images differently when viewed side-by-side compared to when the ‘after only’ version of the same image is shown on its own. Further research is needed to investigate the threshold of exposure to ‘before and after’ images embedded within social media needed for viewers to experience protective effects for body image.
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Turner, M., Ray, A. (2023). Before and After Images on Social Media: The Impact on Female Body Dissatisfaction of Getting Only Half the Picture. In: Stephanidis, C., Antona, M., Ntoa, S., Salvendy, G. (eds) HCI International 2023 Posters. HCII 2023. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 1835. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-36001-5_18
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