Written by Millie Pears
With around two-thirds of our 12-15-year-olds actively using a social media profile, there is growing concern about the relationship between social media use and mental health in adolescents. With the significant rise of more pictorial-based social media platforms (such as Snapchat and Instagram), researchers are eager to explore the link between social media and body dissatisfaction in particular.
Burnette, Kwitowski, & Mazzeo (2017) set about interviewing adolescent girls from an all-girls school in order to understand their perception of the relationship between social media and body image. A total of 38 girls took part in the study and were divided into six focus groups, each of which responded via a semi-structured interview. The transcripts of the girls’ responses from each focus group were then analysed using thematic analysis. Thematic analysis is one method of qualitative (non-numerical) analysis in which researchers identify, analyse and interpret recurring themes or patterns within a body of data (Braun & Clarke, 2006) (in this case transcripts from the focus groups).
From the entire sample, over half the girls reported using social media apps multiple times a day, and Instagram and Snapchat were the most popular apps amongst the girls. When discussing appearance comparisons, which are considered a key mechanism underlying the relation between social media exposure and body image concerns (Cohen & Blaszczynski, 2015; Rodgers & Melioli, 2016) only a handful of participants endorsed some degree of appearance comparison, while many denied such comparisons. It is important to note that while the open structure of focus groups may have encouraged a natural discussion between the participants, it is equally possible that the participants may have censored their responses due to social desirability. That is, the participants may have been unwilling to admit drawing social comparisons in front of their peers.
Despite many participants not personally endorsing appearance comparisons, almost all engaged with behaviours that typically contribute to the association between social media exposure and body image concerns, such as the use of picture-based social media platforms or engaging in photo-based activities. However, the researchers found that the sample tended to adopt a range of attitudes and strategies to mitigate the potentially harmful influence of social media on body image. Chiefly, the sample demonstrated a high level of media literacy, indicating that they recognised the artificial nature of celebrity images. What’s more, when discussing peer comparisons, the sample showed the ability to reflect on and appreciate the qualities of their friends, without necessarily feeling jealous.
So, what does all of this tell us? This study does undeniably provide an interesting insight to adolescent girls’ experiences of social media and how they feel it influences their body image. This is one of the major strengths of thematic analysis; the researchers were able to extract rich, detailed data that was grounded in experience. To this end, unlike most quantitative methods, qualitative methods (or more specifically thematic analysis in this case) aren’t aiming to generalise their findings from a small sample to the wider population. So, while this shouldn’t be considered a representative sample of all adolescent girls’ view of social media, it does provide an invaluable snapshot of these particular girls’ experiences.
References
Braun, V.,
& Clarke, V. (2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research
in Psychology, 3(2), 77-101.
Burnette, C.
B., Kwitowski, M. A., & Mazzeo, S. E. (2017). “I don’t need people to tell
me I’m pretty on social media:” A qualitative study of social media and body
image in early adolescent girls. Body Image, 23, 114-125.
Cohen, R.,
& Blaszczynski, A. (2015). Comparative effects of Facebook and conventional
media on body image dissatisfaction. Journal of Eating Disorders (3), 23.
Rodgers, R.
F., & Melioli, T. (2016). The relationship between body image concerns,
eating disorders and Internet use, Part 1: A review of empirical support. Adolescent
Research Review, 1, 95-119.