The effects of fitspiration and self-compassion Instagram posts on body image and self-compassion in men and women
•Viewing fitspiration images from Instagram promotes lower body satisfaction and appreciation.•Viewing self-compassion images from Instagram leads to improved body satisfaction and appreciation.•Negative effects of viewing fitspiration may be resistant to the mitigating effects of self-compassion.•M...
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| Published in: | Body image Vol. 37; pp. 14 - 27 |
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| Main Authors: | , , |
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Netherlands
Elsevier Ltd
01-06-2021
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Get full text |
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| Summary: | •Viewing fitspiration images from Instagram promotes lower body satisfaction and appreciation.•Viewing self-compassion images from Instagram leads to improved body satisfaction and appreciation.•Negative effects of viewing fitspiration may be resistant to the mitigating effects of self-compassion.•Men and women are equally affected by exposure to fitspiration and self-compassion on Instagram.
Research has demonstrated links between viewing idealized images on social media and body dissatisfaction, but more work is needed to understand how exposure to appearance-related content influences body image. The current research evaluated the effects of viewing fitspiration images and images of self-compassion quotes on Instagram on men and women’s body image and self-compassion. This topic was examined in two separate investigations in the U.S.; a sample of undergraduate students (N = 180, 62 men and 118 women) and a community sample recruited through Amazon Mechanical Turk (N = 296; 173 men and 123 women). In both studies, participants viewed either same-gender images of fitspiration, self-compassion quotes, a combination of fitspiration images and self-compassion quotes, or neutral images (control). Overall, the findings suggest that viewing fitspiration images only promotes lower body satisfaction and appreciation, whereas viewing self-compassion images only leads to improved body satisfaction and appreciation. There was, however, little support for the buffering effects of self-compassion in the combined condition. Our results demonstrate the detrimental effects of exposure to fitspiration content and the positive effects of exposure to self-compassion content on social media for men and women as well as the need for future research in this area. |
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| Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
| ISSN: | 1740-1445 1873-6807 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.bodyim.2021.01.003 |