Research shows that there is a substantial problem in poor body image and social media usage amongst young people. Staggering facts like these have inspired this project on social media’s role in poor body image, and as a huge majority of young people use social media, there is an issue to be fixed in modern day society.
The Facts:​
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“91% of 16-24 year olds use the internet for social networking”
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“Nine in 10 teenage girls say they are unhappy with their body”
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“Around 70% of 18-24 years olds would consider having a cosmetic surgical procedure.”
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“young people can become obsessed with the ways they look on social media”.
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“Social media has certainly been cited as a key driver of the growth of the cosmetic industry, particularly among younger people”
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Young people are wanting to “better match the altered versions of themselves they can create with filters on social media”
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A study found that “almost 93% of the women desired to change at least three zones of their body”
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A survey found “61 per cent of adults and 66 per cent of children feel negatively about their body most of the time”.
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"A UK-wide survey by the Mental Health Foundation of 1,118 teenagers (13-19 years old) in 2019 revealed that one in four girls and one in ten boys had edited photos of themselves in order to change their face or body shape because of concerns about their body image"
Self(ie) Love also wanted to play a part in furthering the understanding about these issues, so we decided to use a small survey addressing social media and body image separately, and as integrated issues, to investigate their effects. Here’s what we found:
of our respondents said that social media negatively impacts their mental health
70%
said they did not feel they had resources and support available to help them with social media negatively impacting their mental health
47%
classified their self-esteem and body image to be ‘highly impacted’ by social media (other answers included somewhat impacted/rarely impacted/not impacted)
30%
claimed they "could be tempted to get cosmetic surgery as there are things I would like to change about myself”
33%
When the 40 respondents were asked on a scale of 1 (not confident) to 5 (very confident) with their body confidence, no one rated themselves as 5 (very confident), yet 15% rated themselves at 1 (not confident)
To see all results, you can find these here