The Impact Of Social Media Use On Women's Self-objectification

It's widely explored that lady's body objectification content in mass media can influence women psychology and behavior.However,previous studies mostly focused on the state self-objectification in the experimental environment,and paid little attention to the impact of online social media on women's trait self-objectification in the context of mobile internet.Based on previous studies,this study constructs a structural equation model on the use of social media,the internalization of women's ideals,trait self-objectification and body surveillance,through a questionnaire survey of female college students,this study examines how the social media exposure affects women's internalization of ideal beauty,self-objectification and body surveillance.The findings showed that the exposure to the content of lady body objectification has positive impact on female college students' cognition,the more exposure,the acknowledge about ideal beauty,and more tend to be self-objectification,the exposure has no significant influence on body surveillance,it has indirect effects on body surveillance through the multiple mediation of ideal beauty and self-objectification.The intermediary mechanism of the internalization of ideal beauty reveals how social media conveys ideal beauty and how the internalization of these information guides women's perception of their bodies,leading to higher trait self-objectification and more frequent body surveillance.This study emphasizes the importance of social media as a source of ideal beauty.In addition,this study also implies that the cognitive dimension of trait self-objectification(internalization and self-objectification)precedes the behavioral dimension(i.e.,body surveillance).The causes of self-objectification of Chinese young women,and the consequences of psychological and social risks were discussed.