Social comparisons on social media: The impact of Facebook on young women's body image concerns and mood

Fardouly, Jasmine; Diedrichs, Phillippa C; Vartanian, Lenny R.; Halliwell, Emma

Abstract

© 2014 Elsevier Ltd. The present study experimentally investigated the effect of Facebook usage on women's mood and body image, whether these effects differ from an online fashion magazine, and whether appearance comparison tendency moderates any of these effects. Female participants (. N=. 112) were randomly assigned to spend 10. min browsing their Facebook account, a magazine website, or an appearance-neutral control website before completing state measures of mood, body dissatisfaction, and appearance discrepancies (weight-related, and face, hair, and skin-related). Participants also completed a trait measure of appearance comparison tendency. Participants who spent time on Facebook reported being in a more negative mood than those who spent time on the control website. Furthermore, women high in appearance comparison tendency reported more facial, hair, and skin-related discrepancies after Facebook exposure than exposure to the control website. Given its popularity, more research is needed to better understand the impact that Facebook has on appearance concerns.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Jan 1, 2015
• Deposit Date: Jan 5, 2015
• Publicly Available Date: Feb 11, 2016
• Journal: Body Image
• Print ISSN: 1740-1445
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 13
• Pages: 38-45
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2014.12.002
• Keywords: Facebook, social media, magazine, appearance-related social comparison, body image, mood
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/837692
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2014.12.002
• Additional Information: Additional Information : NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Body Image. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Body Image, [13, (March 2015)] DOI: 10.1016/j.bodyim.2014.12.002
• Contract Date: Feb 11, 2016