Is social media more harmful than we thought?

By September Mostransky

April 19, 2021

Social media causes body image issues. Someone constantly wanting to change their body after seeing a picture of someone else's on Instagram isn't healthy. It doesn't matter your age or gender; anyone can feel that their body isn't good enough in comparison to those they see while scrolling through pictures on social media.

People forget that not everything seen on social media is real. Photos may appear real, but oftentimes they’re edited and photoshopped. These are the images that we are comparing ourselves to, and they ultimately trigger body image issues.

We all know the infamous Kardashian-Jenner family. Chances are we wished that we looked like them after seeing something they posted on social media. However, these family members aren't strangers to photoshop.

Whether it's Khloe Kardashian editing her face to the point that fans call her “unrecognizable,” or Kylie Jenner photoshopping her waist to appear slimmer and losing half of her leg in the process, people still develop body issues after seeing images like this. They undermine the fact that the photos were photoshopped.

Not every picture posted on social media is fake, but people only tend to post photos that their body looks attractive in.

Jennifer Mills and Jacqueline Hogue did a study proving how social media leads to body image issues. 118 women were selected and asked to browse social media for five minutes. Every single woman left a like or a comment on a post.

It was found that those who engaged with the posts on Instagram were primarily engaging with people they thought were “attractive.”

The Social Media and Body Image study found those who commented and liked posts of people they thought were good looking “subsequently experienced an increase in negative body image…”

Those engaging with posts made by “attractive people,” failed to realize that the post was probably only posted because the person thought they looked attractive in that picture. People don't post pictures where their body looks bad, and that's why comparing ours to others on social media isn't realistic because they don't look that good everyday.

However, some feel that social media helped them feel better about themselves and how their body looked.

“I use it as motivation to get healthier and happier. It makes me feel better about how my body looks,” said Colonie senior, Enzo Lontoc when asked about how social media makes him feel about the way his body looks.

Unfortunately, that is not the case for many people. Out of the ten people (aged 14-18) I spoke to, Lontoc was the only one who felt that social media played a positive role when it came to dealing with body image issues.

“It makes me feel bad about myself and how my body looks. The expectations from society to have a perfect body are just so unrealistic. I feel that social media is a huge contributor to that,” stated Deirdra Sloane.

So how do we as a society collectively stop social media from causing body image issues? We can't stop people from posting edited photos, and we can't stop ourselves from idolizing celebrities who have unrealistic body images posted on social media. But, we can inform boys and girls from a young age that pictures on social media aren't always “real.” The sooner we educate them, the less likely they are to develop body image issues in their older years.