Social media, body image and cognition

Being a millennial living in the 21th century comes down to two things: Internet and technology. No less than 86% of internet use is dedicated to social media, while 30% of these users are between the age of 16 and 30. But, how reliable is what we see on social media? And most importantly, how does it impact those growing up and their view on life?

One of the most alarming sites we can find online are those called “Pro-Ana (Anorexia) and Pro-Mia (Bulimia)” favouring and doing apology for the eating disorders. Just between 2006 and 2010 there was a 470% increase in the number of these websites. How does this affect teenagers going online and potentially receiving these types of messages?

It has been proved in scientific literature that there is a correlation between being exposed to these kinds of messages and developing or presenting a negative evaluation of one’s body and body dissatisfaction. Even so, messages like #Thinspo or #thispo promoting the ideal of thinness keeps expanding on one of the most important platforms used: Instagram. This site keeps working on tools to shut down this kind of messages and ban fostering eating disorders, but since 2011 when there were only 17 variations of this kind of hashtag, there has been over 700 variations created in order to maintain this message alive.

Other posts under the hashtag #fitspiration might seem like they give a positive and healthy outlook on life and on the body, although many of them are still promoting the thinness ideal and, like the others, produce guilt about weight, fat stigmatisation, body reification and food restriction. All while presenting this beauty ideal under a halo of elitism and glamour, making it seem as a mean to gain success and happiness.

The internalisation of these values, promoted by the media, family and peers, favours the development of eating disorders.

So, as the model illustrates, we can see how media is one of the most important factors impacting body satisfaction and psychological wellbeing. This also influences the concept we create regarding reality and our lives. Being overly exposed to a thin ideal can lead to an internalisation of the message, our brain gives meaning to the message and we live it as an absolute reality, without being conscious that this is only an interpretation of it.

The way in which we observe and interpret reality has to do, in a broad sense, with our prefrontal lobe (thought process, making decisions…) and limbic system (emotions…). How we think influences how we feel and vice versa. Our thoughts and the words we say to ourselves impact our brain and can create actual damage, affecting neurons, memory and learning. The way in which we shape our brain by our thoughts and words will influence our emotions (or the other way around), also influencing the perception we have of that around us. The transformation of the observer alters the observed process. We do not see the world that is, we see the world how we are. And like Dr. Mario Alonso Puig, Psychoneuroimmunologist, said: “What the heart wants to feel, the mind ends up showing it to you”.

If we are immersed in a world where we constantly receive thin ideals through social media, and believe them to be the only source of truth and reality acceptable, we will internalise it as a true fact and it will shape the way we think and talk to ourselves and the way we feel about it. Having its psychological impact.

Another important aspect in this situation is the way we influence it with our actions. If we only follow accounts who transfer that message, we will be caught in the Instagram algorithm where we will only receive and see this type of information, increasing the sense of veracity. What can we do about this?

The key word is critical thinking. There isn´t an only way of reality and since it depends on each person’s interpretations it is very much related to culture, language or emotional state. The messages received on social media are constructions, not reflections of reality. Remember: on social media we see what they want us to see, through photoshop, filters, lighting or even the publicity campaigns. It will help to be critical with the information we see, the beauty models that are exposed and question what we are seeing.

Some other things that will help us in our relationship with social media and ourselves is unfollowing those accounts that do not transmit healthy messages, checking that the information is “body positive” and disconnecting from social media by doing activities that free us from the digital world and allow us to live in the present.

We are constantly exposed to online information that will influence our perspectives but through critical thinking and self-care we can choose what information is good for us or not in order to maintain our wellbeing.

Alison Colbert

Master Degree in Clinical Psychology (Universidad de Granada, Spain)

Social Impact Initiative Team Member

References:

Chancellor, S., Pater, J. A., Clear, T., Gilbert, E., & De Choudhury, M. (2016, February). # thyghgapp: Instagram content moderation and lexical variation in pro-eating disorder communities. In Proceedings of the 19th ACM Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing (pp. 1201-1213).

Grabe, S., Ward, L. M., & Hyde, J. S. (2008). The role of the media in body image concerns among women: a meta-analysis of experimental and correlational studies. Psychological bulletin, 134(3), 460.

Stice, E., Schupak-Neuberg, E., Shaw, H. E., & Stein, R. I. (1994). Relation of media exposure to eating disorder symptomatology: an examination of mediating mechanisms. Journal of abnormal psychology, 103(4), 836.

Van den Berg, P., Thompson, J. K., Obremski-Brandon, K., & Coovert, M. (2002). The Tripartite Influence model of body image and eating disturbance. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 53(5), 1007–1020. doi:10.1016/s0022-3999(02)00499-3