Chapter 1

THE PROBLEM AND RELATED LITERATURE

Background of the study

At the present time, social media gave people the opportunity to express

themselves online through creating and customizing their own profiles while

maintaining connections and relationships with other people (Matthew & Martinez,

2014; Wilcox & Stephen, 2014). As users personalize their profiles, they built

certain identities to present themselves online and communicate with other users

of social media. (Gonzales & Hancock, 2011). As stated in Goffman’s theory of

impression management (Cunningham, 2013), people have the desire to make an

individual in favor of them, thus, the profile owner would portray an idealized

version of oneself.

Due to the rising popularity of social media platforms, the distinction of self-

photographs or selfies is expected because of its capacity for one to showcase

identity and gain social feedback. “Selfies” are different from other photos because

they bring major attention to appearance and body (Wagner et al., 2016). That

illustrates the narcissistic nature of selfies which might influence a person who has

low self-confidence levels. Allen and Walter (2016) stated that people of certain

personalities (a specific way of how they think, feel or act) are more prone to

internalize sociocultural factors that can lead to body dissatisfaction. For this

reason social media could trigger people with “vulnerable” personalities to develop

depressive symptoms and possibly experiencing self-image issues. Aggravated by

the ability to present perfect yet non-realistic photos of oneself includes other users

to be exposed of these idealistic photographs in which, body image dissatisfaction

and other negative results are the consequence (Brown and Tiggemann, 2016).

According to Passanante (2013), females who are unsatisfied with

appearance or has a poor self-perception, starts at an early age; females begin to

dislike what they see only just a couple of years after recognizing themselves in

the mirror. There have been several studies stating that very young girls are

starting to adopting certain lifestyles, such as going on diet and taking medications

since they think they are unattractive and not thin enough partly as a byproduct of

projections in social media (Passanante, 2013).

Behan (2015), though, investigated the effects of social media (i.e.,

Facebook and Instagram) on Irish female body image satisfaction through the

application of qualitative methodology. Backed by the social comparison theory,

she interviewed six 18-25-year-old Irish females and found out that “the women

felt negative body image satisfaction when viewing images online through

Facebook and Instagram.” “These negative feelings were predominantly as a

result of upward social comparison engagement” (Behan, 2015).

Highschool students of Stonyhurst Southville International School located

in Batangas, Philippines participated in the research of Vellana (2014) which

focuses on the influence of media on the body image satisfaction among

adolescents. It utilized a survey and a questionnaire entitled Body Areas

Satisfaction Scale, results revealed and was concluded that the internet is the most
frequently used media with the respondents using it often; the level of body area

satisfaction of the respondents is mostly satisfied; the internet is the most

frequently used media by the respondents. Respondents are generally mostly

satisfied with their body areas.

Limjuco (2016) conducted a study entitled “Self-published image rating on

Facebook and self-esteem assessment of the University of the Immaculate

Conception college students.” Studies have revealed that Facebook caters to both

positive and negative effects on "self-esteem;" hence, the study aims to determine

the self-published image ratings of the students and their level of self-esteem and

to evaluate the significant relationship between these variables. Results show that

most of the students do not mind the feedback from other people to every post that

they do on Facebook. Some of them just wanted to maintain their privacy while

others do not participate at all in these commonly identified Facebook-related

activities.

One significant characteristic that separates social media apart from other

media types is peer interaction. It is no surprise that models or celebrities uses

editing techniques to beautify their photos, less known users or “ordinary” social

media users copies their techniques on their selfies, as a part of impression

management in presenting oneself online (Manago et al., 2008; Won Kim & Chock,

2015). Girls who compare themselves to the enhanced selfies of peers have the

tendency to think they are comparing themselves with someone on their level,

rather than celebrities or models who are viewed as unreachable (Jones, 2001).
 The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of social media’s

beauty standards in the self-esteem of young women in Tagum City. Facebook

and Instagram will be used as an example in this study since it is the most popular

platform among the age group and sole focus on self-photographs or selfie. There

are only few researches in Tagum City regarding this issue, thus, this study aims

to provide further information upon this matter. This study will examine the effects

through the use of an online questionnaire. As a result of this study, the researcher

hopes to provide insight into how social media’s beauty standard affects self-

esteem of young women.

Statement of the Research Problem

Beauty standards in the digital age has impacted the self-esteem of young

women, especially with the rise of social media. Therefore, this study specifically

sought to answer the following sub-problems:

1. What is the extent of social media’s beauty standards in terms of?

1.1 Social Comparison

1.2 Audience Feedback

1.3 Narcissism

2. What is the level of self-esteem of young women?

3.Is there any significant relationship between effects of social media’s beauty

standards and level of self-esteem of young women?

4. What variable of the effects of social media’s beauty standards affects self-

esteem of young women the most?

Scope and Limitations

This study focuses on the effects of social media’s beauty standards on self

esteem of young women in Tagum City. The data collection will be conducted

through the utilization of an online questionnaire to users, age ranges between 15-

25 years as a survey and reference. Respondents are specifically picked; she must

be from Tagum City and also an active user in social media platforms.

Other cities in Philippines are not within the scope of this research, this

study is limited only to Tagum City. The researcher restricts a specific age range,

any number outside of is beyond this research. This study will not focus on possible

effects of social media that doesn’t affect young women’s self-esteem.

Significance of the Study

The discoveries of this study is highly significant to the parents, young

women and researchers.

Parents. The study is significant to them in the sense that they will be know

of the possible negative effects these social media usage has on their daughters.

Young women. This study is significant since it will bring awareness apart

from the benefits of social platforms, using these sites more than necessary affects

their mental health.

Researchers. This paper will provide relevant material and additional

information on the influence of social media’s beauty standards on young women.

Definition of Terms
 Chapter 2

Review of Related Literature

On Social Media

The internet can be access by anyone across the world, with a single click,

on any kind of gadget, whether it is with cellphones, tablets, laptop, or computers.

Internet gave birth to social media, it is a series of online applications (such as

blogs, microblogs, social networking sites, video sharing, photo sharing, online

news, among others) that utilizes Web 2.0 internet technology to facilitate an

effective dialogue between users (Kumar & Jan, 2011). The online user-generated

media allowed users to progressively engage and collaborate with support of Web

2.0, that enabled participation on the World Wide Web (WWW). It brought

applications and websites that make web experience more interactive through

user-interaction, dynamic content, meta data and scalability (Best, 2006). Social

media has been known as sites which allow profile creation and visibility of

relationships between users (Boyd & Ellison, 2008) or a set of information

technologies which facilitate interactions and networking (Kapoor et al., 2017;

Oestreicher-Singer & Zalmanson, 2013). Although, it is agreed that Web 2.0

technologies were essential in the maintainance and survival of social media.

Another meaning of social media alludes to “Internet-based applications built on

Web 2.0, while Web 2.0 refers to a concept as well as a platform for harnessing

collective intelligence” (Huang & Benyoucef, 2013). “Web 2.0” refers to the series

of advancement and technology that enable and drive media rich content creation

on the web (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010). It is established in the open source
ideology, whereby users can team up freely, imparting their work and data to one

another. Technological advances in Web 2.0 supported the disclosure of User

Generated Content (UGC). The UGC – provides censorship free and low cost,

upon generating content contributed to the expansion of social media (DesAutels,

2011). Prevalent examples of social media platforms are Facebook, Instagram and

Twitter, that allows people to be connected through online networks. They

introduce substantial and pervasive changes to communication between

businesses, organizations, communities, and individuals.

Along to that availability of the internet comes more exposure to social

media, which has pros and cons. Social media can keep updates and news about

keeping up with announcements and events. It can be also a source of information

and education for those who are studying. On the contrary, social media has major

drawbacks, one of it is; young women are at risk of developing self-image issues

due to the promotion of models with flawless faces and perfect bodies, in which

they often compare themselves with. “Depression and low self-esteem have been

consistently linked in social comparison research and low confidence has been

strongly associated with lower levels of self-esteem” (Durkin, Paxton & Sorbello,

2007).

1.1 Social Comparison Theory

“Social comparison theory, in which individuals develop a self-evaluation in

comparison with others, has also been used to explain media influence” (Benowitz-

Fredericks, Garcia, Massey, Vasagar & Borzekowski, 2012). The urge to evaluate
oneself by comparing one’s abilities and body image with others is inevitable

(Durkin, Paxton, & Sorbello, 2007), especially when faced with “commercials that

uses beautiful and slim models to promote their products and average women are

their target group.” (Anschutz, Strien & Engles, 2008). Researchers Patrick,

Neighbors, & Knee (2004) examined how women with certain personalities would

compare themselves to models in advertisements; their self-esteem and self-

perception of attractiveness were highly affected. Those with high self-esteem

were described as “base their feelings of self-worth on meeting standards and

expectations”. The women with high self-esteem immediately felt negatively after

comparing themselves to the bodies of the models who engage in body shaming

behavior. Those with low self-perception of her attractiveness suffered depressive

feelings and increased negativity.

Schufreider (2015) also argued that there are a lot of factors to compare

oneself to others in social media including “appearance, clothing style, love life, or

social calendar” and the greater the time spent on Facebook, the more time they

can compare themselves to others, “which caused users to begin to feel poorly

about themselves, their self-worth, self-image and self-esteem.” Blease (2015)

concluded that users are highly exposed to variety of successful people that

appears on social media, revealed by their photos and status updates; this

becomes a social competition in the online world. On top of that, according to

Kalnes (2013), adolescent girls invested an enormous amount of time to the

continuous cycle of comparing themselves to their peers on social media and

eventually, it becomes a habit, thus degrading their self-esteem and self-image.

Also, a user who has an active social feedback (e.g., receives tremendous

amounts comments, replies, and virtual “likes” or appreciation of their posts) may

be a target for comparison in terms of fame, social life, or perceived social capital

(Kim & Lee, 2011; Vitak & Ellison, 2013).

1.2 Audience Feedback

Reactions, comments, shares are measurement of audience activity on a

user’s profile that play several roles in social network sites. People also use Likes

and other feedback to estimate how many people see their content (Bernstein,

Bakshy, Burke & Karrer, 2013). Ellison and Vitak (2015) explained that Likes are

“micro-transactions” that can “help create an environment in which reciprocal

attention and low-level social grooming is productively enacted.” Overestimation

of feedback once should receive is called “like paradox,” quite similar to the

“friendship paradox” which explains the phenomenon where people’s friends have

more friends than they do (Forest & Wood, 2012). It is likely that one would distort

their expectation on how much feedback they should expect on their posts when

their friends receive more than they do.

The sense of social belongingness is important in a user in social media, it

may increase or decrease based on the social media use. For example, if one has

many friends or followers on social media and obtain a high amount of positive

feedbacks on posts, he/she might have greater sense of belongingness. In

contrast, an individual would feel a “disconnection from society by spending more

time perusing others’ profiles on Facebook” (Schufreider, 2015). Due to the fact
that “peer acceptance and interpersonal feedback on the self are important

features of friend network sites,” frequent use and exposure to social media can

potentially increase the risk of harm than good (Valkenburg, Peter & Schouten,

2006).

Social recognition in the forms of “likes,” “comments,” and “share” on their

photos or statuses can be important to some people to the point that they measure

their self-worth to the number of reactions and feedback received. Also, “if a

famous friend might give them “like” or “comment” this leads to a boost in their self-

esteem and confidence (Blease, 2015). There is also a tendency where an

individual gets recognized by many online on his/her posts or photos, yet majority

of the comments are negative; this overwhelms the individual, allowing the

negativity to affect his/her self-esteem and overall well-being. On the contrary,

accumulating a large sum of positive feedback in forms of “likes” and “comments”

from friends and followers in one’s self-enhancing posts like flattering pictures and

boastful statuses can be rewarding for the self-esteem of narcissists (Mc Cain &

Campbell, 2016).

1.3 Narcissism

Narcissism is usually characterized by pervasive pattern of

pretentiousness, requirement for appreciation and hyperbolic feeling of

grandiosity. (Mehdizadeh, 2010; Oltmanns, Emery, and Taylor, 2006). In

particular, narcissists are portrayed a fundamentally positive yet unrealistic self-

importance, an absence of enthusiasm in weaving close connection, and a

commitment in self-regulatory practices to affirm the positive assessment of

oneself. (Foster and Campbell, 2007; Ong et al., 2011). A large portion of

theoretical models in psychology concur that narcissists utilize relational

connections to some degree to avow the delusions of their own physical attractive

quality (Vazire, Naumann, Rentfrow & Gosling, 2008).

In 2008, Buffardi and Campbell analyzed how narcissism is showed in

social media platforms. They gathered narcissistic personality reports from 156

undergraduate Facebook users. The profile of the users were designed for

objective and subjective purposes. Strangers see the profile and rate their

impression of the profile owner’s agentic traits, communal traits, and narcissism.

Rating shows that in terms of objective criteria of profiles, narcissism is connected

to a portion of social media activity derived by the amount of friends and number

of posts between Facebook Friends.

The relationship among narcissism and selfie posting behaviors in social

media are significantly related (Fox and Rooney, 2015; Leung, 2013; Sorokowska

et al., 2016). The narcissists’ crave for attention and respect to protecting their own

fragile mental self-perception, posting selfies may sensibly work as a mental path

for which they endeavor to accomplish these self-regulatory purposes (Weiser,

2015). Researchers discovered that narcissism predicts more significant levels of

self-promoting content in a several social media activities (Buffardi and Campbell,

2008).
 Individuals post "selfies" to increase social desirability just as "to enhance

their self-esteem, which happens through the quantity of ‘likes’ a selfie gets"

(Pounders, Kowalczyk & Stowers, 2016). When people have high self-esteem,

they are less troubled or affected by a lower number of “likes” or “comments”.

Alblooshi (2015) utilized a correlational research design to examine self-esteem

and the quantity of selfies an individual takes and posts; from that examination, the

outcomes demonstrated individuals with lower self-esteem took less "selfies"

contrasted with individuals with high confidence. Despite the fact that there wasn’t

a huge contrast between the normal number of selfies taken by individuals with

low confidence (6.61) and individuals with high confidence (8.15), individuals with

higher confidence might take more selfies due of the fact that they are more

confident with their appearances (Alblooshi, 2015).

Moreover, people post photographs of themselves or “selfies” for a variety

of reason and motivation. In the opinion of Hum, Chamberlin, Hambright,

Portwood, Schat, & Bevan (2011), the utilization of Facebook to improve self-view

and increase social desirability; individuals showcase photos of themselves when

they look good or dressed in a certain way then enhance the photo to make them

look better. This is a circumstance where numerous users are contrasting

themselves with others via web-based media and seeing pictures that have been

altered or improved by certain editing techniques and filters.

Another theory behind the motivation of taking “selfies” includes pursuit of

fame, in other words “to do certain things to appear popular” (Wang, Yang, Haigh,
2016). Wang, Yang, and Haigh (2016) used a scale to estimate the pursuit of fame

and established that individuals who scored high deprived for fame posted more

selfies. Interestingly, the researchers additionally tested how selfie viewing

impacted self-esteem and their results demonstrated that “selfie viewing had a

significant negative effect on self-esteem, indicating the more frequent people view

selfies on social media, the lower their self-esteem, which led to decreased life

satisfaction” (Wang, et. Al, 2016). The impact of selfies may likewise be assessed

by one's opinion about selfies. “Perceiving one’s own selfie behavior as self-ironic

and only half committed, allows to fulfill self-presentational needs without feeling

narcissistic (Diefenbach & Christoforakos, 2017).

Several studies showed that narcissism and self-esteem shared common

characteristics. Scholars have clarified the solid relationship between the two

constructs by the way that both narcissists and high self-esteem people share a

great self-perception (Campbell, Rudich & Sedikides, 2002). All things considered

the two characteristics don’t overlap. A critical distinction concerns the

interpersonal implications of these characteristic. Narcissism is fairly hurtful to

relational connections, while self-esteem might be useful. Besides, in clinical

psychology it is broadly acknowledged that narcissism is situated in fragile self-

esteem (Mehdizadeh, 2010). Contrary to narcissism, which a risk for certain types

of addiction (for example impulsive shopping, obsessive gambling), high self-

esteem is firmly connected with mental wellbeing (Biolcati, 2017; Biolcati, Passini

& Griffith, 2015).

On Self-esteem

As indicated by Polce-Lynch, Myers, Kliewer, and Kilmartin (2001), “Self-

esteem, which refers to a person’s general sense of worth or acceptance, is

recognized for the critical role it plays in mental health and psychopathology”. It

can be distinguished by the way an individual behaves and acts, by his/her beliefs

about oneself, his/her emotions or feelings and the overall view of oneself whether

it is optimistic or pessimistic. Guindon (2002) concurs and cited that self-esteem

as "the attitudinal, evaluative segment of oneself; the affective judgements put on

the self-concept comprising of feelings of worth and acceptance which are

maintained and developed as a consequence of awareness of competence and

feedback from the outer world."

Self-esteem can be categorized into two; high self-esteem (HSE) and low

self-esteem (LSE) (Robins, Hendin & Trzesniewski, 2001). HSE indivuduals feel

good about themselves and like who they are; Although, too high can be indicate

as narcissism and destructiveness (Campbell, Rudich & Sedikides, 2002). Those

with LSE either hold ambivalent and mixed emotions toward themselves or hate

themselves, it could trigger anxiety and depression. As studies show, low self-

esteem is strongly associated with depression (Beck, Brown, Steer & Kuyken,

2001). Rosenberg & Owens (2001) stated people with low self-esteem are more

vulnerable than others to situations that endanger their self-esteem. Low

confidence experience significantly less pleasure in life but rather emotional

distress, also anxiety and depression. Individuals with low self-esteem are

pessimistic and critical in general, in which they have the tendency to show
negative attitudes towards other people and groups. Additionally, Baumeister et al.

(2003) concluded that there is a strong interrelation between improved activity &

pleasant emotion towards overall self-esteem and happiness. People with high

self-esteem are at least risk to get depressed in response to stressful situations

while those with low self-esteem are more likely to get depressed and associated

with victimization.

Past research recommends that in certain circumstances, individuals with

lower levels of self-esteem may prefer to communicate online since mediated

communication can be less face-threatening. For example, in hypothetical

circumstances including relational risk (e.g. asking for an increase in salary,

requesting a date), individuals with low self-esteem showed a stronger inclination

for email and a weaker inclination for close up communication contrasted with

individuals with higher levels of self-esteem. (Joinson, A. N. 2004). A later report

exhibited that individuals with lower self-esteem agreed that Facebook is a safe

spot to express themselves than individuals with high self-esteem (Forest & Wood,

2012). Individuals with lower self-esteem were likewise bound to see the

advantages to express their thoughts and feelings to someone in Facebook

instead of face to face. Furthermore, despite of trait-level self-esteem, individuals

who visit Facebook in the times of low self-worth, (for example, subsequent to

getting a poor performance review) felt an increase to their self-esteem although it

may be short-term (Toma and Hancock, 2013).

 However, while individuals with lower self-esteem might be attracted to

sharing on Facebook, they may express negative thoughts and pessimistic

opinions, which thusly causes them to show up less likable, at least to strangers

surveying their profiles. Besides, a study found that individuals with lower levels of

self-esteem were bound to incline toward the utilization of text-based

communication like chatting, texting or social media sites to discuss about a

conflict with a partner despite the fact that the use of mediated communication was

related with possibilities of negative outcomes (Baker, 2002).