Impact of Social Media on Self-Esteem

Abstract

The rise of social media has become an
epidemic that doesn’t seem to be stopping any time soon. The
social-comparison theory is the idea that individuals are constantly
self-evaluations compared to others. This theory suggests that our self-esteem
is affected by this social comparison and how we determine our self-worth. Because of this, there is reason to believe that as the use of social media becomes more frequent, self-esteem decreases.

Keywords:
self-esteem, social-comparison theory,
social media

The
Impact of Social Media on Self-Esteem

Within the last two decades, the internet has provided
us with an online gateway to endless communication with almost anyone in the
world with the few simple clicks of a button. Social media has evolved into
more than just a form of communicating. It has become almost a lifestyle for
modern culture, allowing individuals with access to a computer, cellphone, or
other electronic device to share any detail of their life with the world. It
has changed the way many people interact and has placed an entirely different
aspect of self-disclosure on society. As social media use continues to
intensify, research regarding the correlation between social media and the
decline of self-esteem has become a growing research topic in the field of
psychology.

Get Help With Your Essay

If you need assistance with writing your essay, our professional essay writing service is here to help!
Find out more about our Essay Writing Service

The social-comparison theory is the idea that
individuals are constantly self-evaluating and comparing themselves to others.
This theory suggests that our self-esteem is affected by social comparison and
alters how we determine our self-worth. This theory supports the idea that as
the use of social media become more frequent the self-esteem of the individual
decreases.

Social Media

After the development of the Internet, the world was
introduced to a new form of communication. Social networking is the use of
particular websites and applications to interact with other users. These
websites and applications that enable the user to participate in social
networking is what we refer to as social media. Social media sites have become an outlet
for individuals to share information, pictures, and videos of themselves for
other’s to view with a click of a button. Affiliations, schedules,
announcements, and more personal content have become a normality to disclose on
the Internet and share with the world.

Social media’s influence on the population continues
to grow more prevalent, predominantly in teenagers and young adults. Currently,
the most commonly used social media site used for social networking is
Facebook, launched in 2004 at Harvard University with the intention of being a
form of communication for university students. Facebook now has over one
billion active users, continuing to significantly increase and is available to
anyone who has an email address
(Kittinger,
Correia, & Irons, 2012).

Wilson, Gosling, & Graham (2012) revealed that
over four billion pieces of content are uploaded to Facebook on a daily basis,
with 250 million pieces of that content being pictures. With an unlimited
amount of space, social media applications have made it a simple process to
upload countless pictures and videos to the site that can be viewed by friends,
family, acquaintances, and even strangers. On Facebook alone, over ninety
percent of users upload content and update statuses on a regular basis. That
does not include the content uploaded to other social networking applications
such as Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat.

As time goes forward, social media has become not only
a way to share content, but a form of therapy for some people. Studies have
indicated that there are much higher levels of self-disclosure and personal
information on the Internet than ever before. In fact, further research has
shown that people are willing to disclose more personal and sensitive
information on social networking sites than in person.

According to Chen and Lee (2013), previous research
has derived that there appears to be a connection between more time spent
online and a decline in face-to-face communication with family and peers, which
often leads to feelings of loneliness and depression.

Low Self-Esteem

Self-esteem is the appraisal of the value or worth of
the self. It is the subjective emotional evaluation that is considered to be an
important indicator of one’s well-being. Self-esteem can be perceived both
positively and negatively, and has shown to be interpreted differently in
different stages of life (Forest & Wood, 2012).

Someone with low self-esteem may portray more
introverted characteristics such as social anxiousness, loneliness, and
shyness, however, there are circumstances where a socially extroverted person
may have low self-esteem and overcompensate. The need to be accepted plays a
large role in self-esteem, and social media may act as a tool in a person’s
search for social acceptance.

According to Chen and Lee (2013), individuals with generally low self-esteem tend to self-disclose as a way to gain acceptance. Feelings of inadequacy and self-loathing stem from frequent exposure to other people’s positive representations of their lives; inflicting the thought that others have a more fulfilling life than they do. Viewing happy and fun-looking photographs on social networking sites can formulate the idea that other people are constantly living happy and fun lives in contrast to their own lives; therefore frequent use of social media is correlated with low self-esteem and greater psychological distress.

People who typically have lower self-esteem than others attempt to compensate with the use of social media (Amichai-Hamburger & Vinitzky, 2010). A study conducted by Igor Pantic (2004) of one hundred Facebook users at a local university showed that people who had more self-promoting content and spent more time on the social media application had lower levels of self-esteem. By increasing the amount of friends and followers, accepting and requesting strangers as friends, posting often, and logging into social media sites frequently, individuals that possess lower self-esteem search for the approval from others by receiving “likes” on the social media site. These “likes” are the source of approval that many people search for on social media, believing that the more likes you receive, the more liked you are as a person, which is not the case. Those more concerned with their self-image are more likely to “friend” other users in order to compensate for their social fulfillment, idealizing that more “friends” on a social media site indicates a higher level of popularity (Lee, Moore, Park, & Park, 2012). It was noted that females spend more time on social media than males, and that females generally have more friends and followers. However, women indicated lower satisfaction in regards to body image and weight consciousness.

Social media sites allow a person to create an
enticing persona by choosing not only what to post, but also what to not post
on the network. Presenting only flattering images, posting the partaking of
certain activities, and only revealing the more glamorous aspects of their
lives can present a desirable, but misleading lifestyle. There are features on
social media sites that allow a person to remove, untag, or report unflattering
images of themselves that they don’t wish others to view. Tazghini and
Siedlecki (2013) claim that individuals with low self-esteem frequently “untag”
themselves from pictures that they find unflattering so that they can maintain
their desired image.

Forest and Wood (2012) found that people with low
self-esteem have the tendency to gravitate more towards negativity on social
media rather than something positive. These individuals are more prone to
posting and sharing content that stems arguments and negative attention, thus
creating a sense of “attention” directed towards themselves. Previously
conducted research has shown that people who reported more negative interaction
and less positive interaction during social networking reported higher levels
of depressive symptoms.  Bergman et al.
(2011) argues that if an individual is already suffering from low self-esteem,
social media usage will sustain those feelings.

A study conducted by Seidman (2013) found that highly
neurotic individuals were more inclined to post and share content on their
social media profiles. Additional research conducted by Pantic (2014)
associated excessive Facebook usage with a variety of psychiatric disorders
including anxiety, depression, and eating disorders. The study revealed that
approximately fifty percent of females reported dissatisfaction in relation to
their bodies. It was theorized that this was a result of the emphasis on being
thin that is portrayed in the media

Conclusion

The
theory that social media usage has a negative effect on self-esteem has been
supported by multiple conducted studies. Data collected from young adults,
particularly college students, has been fundamental in the research surrounding
self-esteem and social media, but has presented limitations in the studies
because the sample does not represent the entire population. Therefore further
research is required to obtain confirmation on this theory.

The
importance of further research on the effects social media has on self-esteem
is extremely prevalent, especially as the use of social media increases.  Children are beginning to have access to
social networking sites which means that they are exposed to the same content
as adults, which can be incredible risk to their under-developed behaviors and
self-esteem. Self-awareness of what is on the internet and that not everything
is truth

References

• Amichai-Hamburger, Y. & Vinitzky, G. (2010). Social network use and personality. Computers in Human Behavior, 26(2010), 1289-1295.
• Bergman, S. M., Fearrington, M. E., Davenport, S. W., & Bergman, J. Z. (2011). Millennials, narcissism, and social networking: What narcissists do on social networking sites and why. Personality and Individual Differences, 50, 706–711.
• Chen, W. & Lee, K. (2013). Sharing, liking, commenting, and distressed? The pathway between Facebook interaction and psychological distress. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 16(10), 728-734.
• Forest, A. L., & Wood, J. V. (2012). When social networking is not working: Individuals with low self-esteem recognize but do not reap the benefits of self-disclosure on Facebook. Psychological Science, 23(3), 295-302.
• Kittinger, R., Correia, C., & Irons, J. (2012). Relationship between Facebook use and problematic Internet use among college students. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 15(6), 324-327.
• Lee, J., Moore, D., Park, E., & Park, S. (2012). Who wants to be friend-rich? Social compensatory friending on Facebook and the moderating role of public selfconsciousness. Computers in Human Behavior, 28(2012), 1036- 1043.
• Pantic, I. (2014). Online social networking and mental health. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, X(X), 1-6.
• Tazghini, S. & Siedlecki, K. (2013). A mixed approach to examining Facebook use and its relationship to self-esteem. Computers in Human Behavior, 29, 827-832.
• Seidman, G. (2013). Self-presentation and belonging on Facebook: How personality influences social media use and motivations. Personality and Individual Differences, 54, 402-407.
• Wilson, R., Gosling, S. & Graham, L. (2012). A review of Facebook research in the social sciences. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(3), 203-220.