An online mirror? Facebook use, body image, and attitudes towards appearance among university women

This study explores how young women (ages 18-25) enrolled in an undergraduate or graduate program in one northeast university interact with and understand photographs posted on Facebook, focusing on the relationship between Facebook use and attitudes towards appearance and body image. The new Sociocultural Attitudes Towards Appearance Questionnaire- Facebook Scale (SATAQ-FS) was developed from the Sociocultural Attitudes toward Appearance Scale -3 (SATAQ-3) (Thompson, van den Berg, Roehrig, Guarda, & Heinberg, 2003). A factor analysis established construct validity for the SATAQ-FS paralleling the SATAQ-3. 161 women completed the SATAQ-FS and the Multidimensional Body-Self Relations Questionnaire (MBSRQ) Appearance Orientation subscale (Cash, 2000), and 14 women participated in one of three focus groups. Quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics, and qualitative data were analyzed using a process of open and axial coding. Findings indicate that women use photos on Facebook for impression management and interact with photos on Facebook to construct their own online identity and to learn about the identity of others. Appearance orientation was correlated with certain SATAQ-FS subscales, indicating that women who have a high degree of appearance orientation make comparisons on Facebook and understand Facebook to be a source of information about attractiveness at a significantly higher rate than women with a moderate to low appearance orientation. Women who are single are more likely than women in a relationship to make comparisons on Facebook, and are more likely than women in a "complicated" relationship to see Facebook as an important source of information about attractiveness.