Body Image and Social Media
An interview with Dr. Sophia Choukas-Bradley
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5 min read
Welcome to our very first Expert Sapien Interview! Today we’re hearing from Dr. Sophia Choukas-Bradley. Sophie is a psychology professor at the University of Delaware, and the author of Psychology of Adolescence, a popular blog on the science of teens, screens, gender, and sexuality. Full disclosure: she is also a close friend and collaborator. Beyond her many professional accomplishments, she holds the distinction of having gifted my son one of his favorite books: a finger puppet board book titled Baby Piglet. Today she’s sharing her expertise on teens, body image, and social media—plus more on her love of both books and pigs.
Jackie: Welcome, Sophie! I’m so excited to have you here for my very first Expert Sapien Interview. Let’s start by having you introduce yourself: who you are, where you work, what you do, etc.?
Sophie: I’m so happy to be here, Jackie! I’m a clinical psychologist and I’m currently an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Delaware, moving to the University of Pittsburgh this summer. I direct the Teen and Young Adult Lab, conducting research studies to understand how social media affects adolescent mental health.
Jackie: So I want to focus our conversation today on one of the many areas where you have expertise—social media and body image. I think there’s a lot of misunderstanding about body image and eating disorders out there, so I’m hoping we can start with a high-level overview. What is body image? How does it relate (or not relate) to eating disorders? Are there particular groups for whom body image and eating disorders are more relevant concerns (i.e., ages, genders, etc.)?
Sophie: Great questions and you’re right, there’s a lot of misunderstanding about these issues. Body image refers to how we feel about our physical appearance, including our faces, bodies, hair, etc. Although body image concerns are common across the lifespan, they’re most common among teen girls, with some estimates suggesting more than three-quarters of U.S. girls experience dissatisfaction with their bodies. There’s a clear connection between body image concerns and disordered eating: many people who feel negatively about their bodies engage in disordered eating behaviors in order to try to change their weight and shape, such as by excessively restricting their caloric intake, using diet pills, or engaging in cycles of fasting and binge-eating.
Disordered eating is very common in adolescence, especially among girls—some studies suggest that as many as 60% of teen girls have engaged in unhealthy weight control behaviors in the past year. In some cases, disordered eating can lead to clinically diagnosable eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. In the U.S., about 4% of teen girls and 1.5% of teen boys will develop an eating disorder. My lab and others are currently conducting research to better understand eating disorder risk in transgender teens, with early research suggesting they may be at higher risk.
Jackie: We hear a lot about how social media is bad for body image, and how it might contribute to rising rates of eating disorders (in teens especially). Is this true? What effect do you think social media has on body image?
Sophie: I do believe we have enough research evidence at this point to say that highly-visual social media apps such as Instagram can provide the “perfect storm” for exacerbating body image concerns, especially among some teen girls. Social media apps bombard girls with images of peers, influencers, and celebrities, which have often been carefully curated and edited to showcase physical beauty. This heightened exposure to unrealistic beauty standards can lead teens to engage in social comparison, and some girls may experience body dissatisfaction and body shame as a result.
Jackie: Could you tell us about a study related to social media and body image that you’re currently running? How does it work and what are you finding?
Sophie: Several of my recent and current research studies focus on a construct I call appearance-related social media consciousness (ASMC), with a wonderful group of colleagues including you! We define ASMC as reflecting the extent to which individuals think about whether they might look attractive to a social media audience. We spent several years developing a scale that researchers can use to measure people’s ASMC. Example items include, “I try to guess how people on social media will react to my physical appearance in my pictures,” and, “Even when I’m alone, I imagine how my body would look in a social media picture.”
This scale has now been translated into many different languages, and I’m excited to see what researchers around the world will find in the coming years. What we’ve found in my lab is that among U.S. teens, higher ASMC predicts increased body image concerns and depressive symptoms over time. Some of our next steps include studying ASMC experiences among LGBTQ+ teens, understanding day-to-day changes in ASMC, and using eye-tracking to understand where teens visually focus on social media photos and how that’s connected to ASMC and body dissatisfaction.
Jackie: What would you say to a parent who is concerned about the effects social media is having on their teen’s body image? What recommendations would you give? How would you suggest that parents start that conversation?
Sophie: It’s normative and developmentally appropriate for teens to compare their physical appearance to others’ appearance. What’s not natural is how social media provides constant and unrealistic sources of social comparison.
Ask your teen how they would describe someone of their gender who looks “perfect.” You may be shocked by how specific their description is, as social media has contributed to an increased focus on more and more specific indicators of bodily “perfection” (for example, young women have described to me what the perfect ankle looks like, based on what they’ve seen on social media). Then, ask your teen to show you examples of people on their social media feeds who meet these “perfect” standards. Ask your teen how they think the “perfect” people achieved that look, whether they look like that in real life, and whether they look like that all the time. For example, do the “perfect”-looking influencers use editing tools to look that way? Do your teen’s classmates look different online than in person? As you discuss these questions, ask your teen how often they compare themselves to these images, and how it makes them feel. Are there other ways they can spend their time, on or off social media, that would make them feel better?
Jackie: This was a really helpful overview, and I think these are great conversation starters for anyone who lives or works with teens.
Okay, now I want to transition to a few questions about you and your own technology use. First: what’s one thing people might be surprised to learn about you—something they wouldn’t know from reading your resume?
Sophie: I grew up in rural Maryland with a 700-pound pet pig!
Jackie: I’ve envied you for many reasons, but one is that you have that as a “fun fact” to use during any ice breaker activities. Puts the rest of us to shame.
Next: I might be cheating with this question because I happen to know this about you as your friend—but you are probably the only person I know who doesn’t use social media! Could you talk a little bit about this decision, and what the pros and cons have been for you?
Sophie: Psychology researchers often say “research is me-search,” and this is certainly true for my research on social media and body image. About ten years ago, when I was in my mid-twenties, I attended a family reunion in rural Vermont where we didn’t have internet or cell service. You’re probably thinking this is a story about the liberation I felt once free from my devices. But actually what happened was, my cousin was taking photos throughout the trip to post on Facebook later. And instead of enjoying being surrounded by beautiful Vermont greenspace with my family, I found myself distracted by imagining how I might look to a Facebook audience. This experience was the inspiration for my later research on appearance-related social media consciousness.
As soon as I got home from that trip, I deactivated my Facebook account. I never logged in again. And when Instagram, Snapchat, and other photo-based social media sites came on the scene, I never joined them. Not being on these photo-based social media sites for the past decade, I’ve been able to be more mindfully present in my relationships and my life. My body image also definitely improved, once I was no longer so focused on taking and posting photos. But of course there’s much more to social media than body image-focused content. For example, a big con is I miss exciting life updates from friends, like seeing photos of your baby!
Jackie: It’s okay, I’m happy to just continue texting you (too many) photos of him reading Baby Piglet.
Finally: what are some of the positive things you’re getting out of your technology use right now? This could be favorite apps, things you love doing on your phone or laptop, etc.?
Sophie: For the past three years, I’ve used the Goodreads app to work toward my 100-books-a-year reading challenge. And it still feels like magic when I check out library ebooks and audiobooks and they instantly appear on my phone through the Libby app. I also really love taking photos of my beautiful tuxedo cat, Balsam. My wife jokes that I’m going to give Balsam body image problems.
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