Self Esteem Case Study

Examining the impact of self-esteem on various aspects of selfie-taking behaviours in an adult sample

Li-Ann Smal

Lab Group 1

13320884

Abstract

Tables of Contents Introduction

Since the mass availability of the Internet in the 1970s, social media sites (SMS) have been gradually gaining prominence. The first social network to gain major recognition was Friends Reunited in 1999. Several other sites emerged in popularity such as Friendster, Myspace, Bebo and Twitter. In 2004, Facebook was founded. Facebook is the largest social network in the world, with over 1.23 billion monthly active users (Protalinski, 2014). Instagram (founded 2010), with its 200 million monthly users (Instagram, 2014), is a mobile site primarily used for sharing photos

People with high self-esteem scored a mean of 3.30 (Neutral) (SD = 1.36) whereas people with low self-esteem scored a mean of 3.54 (Important) (SD = 1.2). A table of the means and standard deviations of each question can be found below (Table 1).

Another significant result is that people with low self-esteem take more selfies in public places than people with high self-esteem [M = 2.37 (SD = 1.09) compared to M = 2.04 (SD = 1.15)].

From the results, it shows that people with low self-esteem care less than people with high self-esteem if their selfie receives very few ‘likes’ on Instagram. 18 (51.4%) people with low self-esteem said they would not care if their selfie did not enough ‘likes’, compared to just 12 (26.1%) people with high self-esteem. It also shows that people with high self-esteem regard ‘likes’ on Facebook of a higher importance than people with low self-esteem [16 (34.8%) compared to 11 (31.4%)]. A full table of the individual results can be found in Appendix

The self-esteem measure was not exclusively tied to one core set of dimensions (e.g. I feel good about myself). The customised Selfie scale was not designed to accommodate the scoring of responses – this led to difficulties when computing the data, as the different variables could not be added as one overall value. There may also have been slight bias when respondents answered the questions, as they all knew at least one experimenter. There was also a distinct inequality between the number of males and females, there should have been an almost equal amount.

For future research, it would be advised to amend the customised Selfie scale to have similar values that can be computed as one whole value. A suggestion would also be to narrow the search criteria, evaluate each question individually and focus on one specific aspect of selfie-taking behaviours. A possible avenue for future research would be to examine different cultures and their selfie-taking behaviours. On this note, examining slightly younger ages may be of use, as they will have been raised in the “selfie” generation, having been born in the age of modern