Check The Impact Of Selfies On Social Networking Sites On Women's Body Image Satisfaction

In recent years,social networking sites(SNS)have been widely used all over the world,and they have been an important part of our life.Facebook,as the largest SNS,has more than 1.45 billion active daily users.In China,Wechat Moment and QQ zone users respectively account for 85.8%and 67.8%in 772 million Chinese Internet users.Researches indicate that using SNS has negative effects on users' body image satisfaction,even for a relatively short time.To date,although there are some researches investigating the relationship between the passive and/or the active use of SNS and body image satisfaction,there is no research investigating the influence of specific using behavior on the body image satisfaction.To fill in this gap,the current research will focus the influence of the specific using behavior(selfie-viewing)on the body image satisfaction of female college students,as well as the mechanisms underlying the relationship between them because young female is more susceptible to body image problem.In Study 1,Selfie-viewing Questionnaire,Thin-ideal Internalization Scale,Body Image Dissatisfaction Scale,and Effortful Control Scale were used among 384 female college students to explore the long-term effect of selfie-viewing.The results showed that selfie-viewing frequency is negatively associated with female body image satisfaction,and the relationship between them was mediated by thin-ideal internalization and moderated by effortful control.In Study 2,the short-term effect of selfie-viewing above the cognitive threshold was further investigated in the lab setting.120 female participants were randomly assigned to three groups(i.e.,Group A viewing high attractive selfies of peers,Group U viewing low attractive selfies of peers,Group C is the control group viewing the neutral pictures selected from the International Affective Picture System).The results showed that the body image satisfaction decreased significantly in Group A,while the other groups remain unchanged.In Study 3,the short-term effect of selfie-viewing below the cognitive threshold was further investigated in the lab setting.No significant change was found in all groups.Based on all the results above,we drew out the conclusions as followed:(1)Viewing the selfies posted on SNS has a long-term negative effect on female college students' body image satisfaction,which is mediated by thin-ideal internalization.Although the second stage of the indirect effect is moderated by effortful control,high effortful control cannot efficiently buffer the adverse effect of selfie-viewing on body image satisfaction.(2)Above the cognitive threshold,viewing the attractive selfies of peers posted on SNS has a short-term negative effect on female college students' body image satisfaction.(3)Below the cognitive threshold,viewing the selfies of peers posted on SNS has not short-term negative effect on female college students' body image satisfaction.In sum,the current research investigated the effects of selfie-viewing on female body image satisfaction,as well as its mechanisms and individual differences.It has certain theoretical significance for further understanding the impact of SNS use on individual psychosocial adaptation and has certain practical guiding significance for formulating intervention programs to improve female body image satisfaction.