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Selfie Phenomenon

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> The selfie phenomenon: 3 reasons why people love to take selfies
By Christine M. Kowalczyk, East Carolina University, USA
Did you know, that women aged 16 to 25 spend an average of five hours a week taking selfies, and posting an average of three selfies a day?

The selfie phenomenon, which has transformed our social culture, is commonly understood to be a photograph that has been taken by oneself, usually with a smart phone or webcam and shared on social media. Today, people post millions of selfies each day to social media sites, such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

Selfies are a form of self-presentation and expression, an interpersonal communication where a person conveys an image about him or herself to another individual. In addition to this, self-presentation enables a person to influence and manage the perception of themselves, by others. Every day, people present their 'selves', through their outfit choices, hairstyles and with brands to express themselves in a specific context.

But what motivates people to post selfies? Research from the article, "Insight into the motivation of selfie postings: impression management and self-esteem', published by Emerald Group Publishing, explores the growing phenomenon of selfie-postings, with a focus on what motivates female millennials to spend so much time posting selfies across social media.

Managing impressions

Female millennials are typically motivated to post selfies in order to manage their reputation. Impression management refers to the conscious or subconscious process of influencing and potentially controlling the perceptions of others about a person, object, or event. People can attempt to create impressions of not only their personal attributes, but also their attitudes, status, physical state, and interests.

Millennial women use selfies to portray a specific image as a reflection of their life, even if it is not genuine. Social media encourage some users to show their ideal-selves because it leads others to have a more favourable impression of them, despite how accurate it may be. In our study, we found that women post both authentic and false posts to manage their reputation of being happy and physically attractive, for example.

3 reasons why we post selfies

To convey happiness

Millennial women hope that their selfies convey happiness. Women like to post selfies as a way to collect happy moments, which can then serve as a reflection of their lives. They tend not to post selfies when they are sad or upset, posting photos which only showcase the best parts of their lives. Selfies often reflect how women would like to be perceived. By posting selfies that are indicative of happiness, they develop this desired identity.

To show beauty

Millennial women post selfies when they look physically attractive to create an image of beauty. Similar to happiness, women desire to create and manage this identity through a selfie.

To enhance self-esteem

Self-esteem can be seen as a motivation for posting selfies and an outcome of selfie posting for example, just as a substantial number of 'likes' can positively impact a person's self-esteem, a lack of 'likes' can negatively impact it.

Instant gratification

Taking photos is not a new concept, and digital technology has allowed people to take and delete images anywhere, any time; better connect with others and promote the self. Selfie-postings provide people with a channel to manage others' impressions of them, creating and boosting their self-esteem, which can support their happiness and physical attractiveness.

The selfie phenomenon is transforming social culture. Selfies allow the opportunity for instant gratification in the form of positive feedback, shares and likes, something which has only been made possible with the rise of social media.

This blog is based on the research paper "Insight into the motivation of selfie postings: impression management and self-esteem", Read the full article.

Don't forget to take a look at our selfie special for more selfie research.

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The selfie phenomenon: 3 reasons why people love to take selfies

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The selfie phenomenon: 3 reasons why people love to take selfies By Christine M. Kowalczyk, East Carolina University, USA The selfie phenomenon, which has transformed our social culture, is commonly understood to be a photograph that has been taken by oneself, usually with a smart phone or webcam and shared on social media.

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Selfies as a feminist tool

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Lianna Pisani, Master of Arts in Communication and Culture, Ryerson and York Universities
This presentation examines how women use the selfie through technologies of smart phones and social media as a communication tool to challenge oppressive political statements and ideologies. Drawing from selfie research leaders such as Theresa Senft and Nancy Baym (2015), this paper explores political feminist selfies using a new definition of the selfie, as both a sociocultural practice and an object with ties to material frameworks. Through a case study analysis of feminist selfie campaigns, ranging from selfies in direct response to national politics to selfies that challenge the representations and presentations of the female body in popular news culture, this paper approaches social media culture as the necessary platform for feminist selfie campaigns.

Lianna Pisani ( lpisani@ryerson.ca) graduated in summer 2015 from Ryerson and York University's joint Master of Arts program in Communication and Culture in Toronto, Ontario.

Political selfies are no longer a singular genre of selfies. This category has grown to encompass a multitude of selfies that address ideological statements and concepts through the performance of the selfie-taker. The reigning selfie celebrity, Kim Kardashian-West, represents the term selfie as a shortened version of "selfish," though she is not alone. Popular media reinforces, through discourse, a cultural association between the selfie and pathologies such as narcissism (Burns, 2015), discounting the complexities of the selfie. Selfies can be political, and feminist; there are examples of women all over the world enacting political and feminist gestures through selfies. These enactments may range from selfies in direct response to government legislation, or in response to theorized socio-cultural values, such as human rights issues or issues of individual identity and self-representation. Jon Packer, for the Huffington Post, wrote in 2014 that, "Selfies are entertaining but they're not journalism," a sentiment with which I strongly disagree. Perhaps, what is not "good journalism" is simply reporting various selfie campaigns, and forgetting that this particular genre of selfie deserves a nuanced, critical exploration[1]. Arguably an emerging genre, the spectrum of political feminist selfies presents a salient case study of the selfie's function as an effective medium for performing the body as representation, and as selfie object in order to challenge the female body as a site of oppression.

Since its declaration as the Oxford English Dictionary's Word of the Year in 2013, the selfie has remained ubiquitous and shows no signs of forfeiting media headline space. Oxford reports that between November 2012 and November 2013, the term itself increased in usage by 17000% (2013). Leaders of selfie research, Theresa Senft and Nancy Baym, have pointed out the irony in this fact; despite the word's rise to fame, the term and the practice it refers to "remain fundamentally ambiguous, fraught, and caught in a stubborn and morally loaded hype cycle" (2015, p. 1588). The definition of "selfie," in this ambiguous state, becomes particularly important in news dissemination, as journalists are given the opportunity to create the definition. What do we really know about the selfie? We know that "selfie" is a shortened form of "self-portrait." We know that companies like Dove tried to capitalize on it with a beauty campaign. We know that cell phone companies have been improving the quality of front-facing cameras so we can all take selfies with crisper definition. We know that we have long metal sticks to hold our phones so we can take selfies while we travel and get kicked out of famous museums. But how can we define selfie without discrediting its cultural value?

When the Oxford English Dictionary added selfie to its online dictionary in 2013, they defined it as "A photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website." However, Senft and Baym insightfully identity the selfie as both an object as well as a practice- something that it seems Oxford's definition has hinted toward but did not quite verbalize. According to Senft and Baym, "...a selfie is a photographic object that initiates the transmission of human feeling in the form of a relationship (between photographer and photographed, between image and filtering software, between viewer and viewed, between individuals circulating images, between users and social software architectures, etc.). A selfie is also a practice-a gesture that can send (and is often intended to send) different messages to different individuals, communities, and audiences" (2015, p. 1589).

I am particularly interested in how self-identifying women use the selfie through the practices and technologies of smart phones and social media as a communication tool to challenge oppressive political statements and ideologies. The instantaneous nature of the selfie via smart phone, and its ability to be shared with friends immediately through social media has adapted from that of Edwin Land's Polaroid technology. Through social media, a massive archive of the online selfie phenomenon has been created like an album of Polaroids. I argue that these key characteristics of the selfie- the speedy capture of the selfie as object and the quick posting of the selfie as practice- have allowed for the selfie to become the instrument of a new feminist movement. This in no way means that all selfies are feminist; however, that through the social uses of selfies, and popular culture's focus on women taking selfies, we can see how selfies have allowed women to play with identity representation. We can see how selfies have offered a new method for self-representation that is reminiscent of the Polaroid, and of the 1970s Feminist Art Movement, despite forced connections between the selfie phenomenon and a narcissistic culture that dominate media coverage.

Peter Buse's 2010 publication, "Polaroid into Digital: Technology, cultural form and the social practices of snapshot photography," sheds light on why selfies have become so ubiquitous through an exploration of the cultural forgetting of the Polaroid. The Polaroid, like the selfie, could be defined as an image as object, as well as a cultural practice. Buse, through his analysis of the Polaroid and the monopoly this instant photography maintained in the 1980s and 1990s (p. 218), highlights one of the propellers of the selfie phenomenon: "The basic leisure activity here is surely the near simultaneous pairing of taking and showing, of production and consumption" (p. 222). The selfie in particular shares with the Polaroid precisely what made it a novelty- the ability to quickly capture and recapture photos, and share the photos while still in the same location. Buse recalls advertisements for the Polaroid in 1954, emphasizing a depiction of a group huddled around the Polaroid, photo-object newly peeled from the negative. "There they are, absorbed, like incipient digital camera users, in the immediacy of the photograph" (Buse, 2010, p. 222), the precursors to contemporary social media users. The instantaneous nature of the smart phone camera, typically used to capture selfies, is contrary to the notion of carefully constructing a photo. The ability to snap multiple shots per second and have them instantly appear in a photo library makes it novel, even more so than the Polaroid and other digital forms of photography that need to be transferred from memory stick to computer hard drive.

Part of the cultural practice of taking selfies is the capability to archive them through social media. This archive allows for multiple participants to insert their photos into the same photo album, so to speak, by tagging them with the same hashtag. This capability, I argue, has provided the platform for feminist selfie campaigns. One of the major feminist selfie archives on Twitter was initiated in summer of 2014, when Turkish Deputy Prime Minister, Bulent Arinc, said in a speech that women "should know what is decent and what is not decent. She should not laugh loudly in front of all the world and should preserve her decency at all times" (O'Connor, 2014). The response was a barrage of selfies of women laughing posted to social media sites. Images from both Turkish women as well as other women internationally joining in solidarity were posted a short time after the speech was made public, including a contribution from Emma Watson, the United Nations' Goodwill Ambassador/Feminist It Girl since July 2014.

This movement made international headlines, possibly due to this ability to flip through the archived photo album and view the massive number of contributions. This hashtag system arguably enlightened many more individuals of the attempts for political resistance occurring in Turkey through its gathering of a social media family surrounding a hashtag-constructed photo album. Without making this selfie movement an effort in understanding Turkish culture, simply focusing on the selfie as political resistance, as feminist cultural movement, we can see how the selfie has emerged as a political tool for activism.

Over the past couple of years, selfies charged with political intent crept onto social media and quickly archived in the thousands through social media hashtag systems. Initiators and participants of these campaigns are international, residing in various countries, but striving toward shared goals. Concurrently, there has been a dangerous and ignorant popular view of selfies swirling the web and social media sites. Dr. Pamela Rutledge's blog post for Psychology Today questions the selfie as one of two extremes, "#Selfies: Narcissism or Self-Exploration?" (2013). The News-Herald asks in an article, "Are all those selfies making us narcissists?" (2014). Meanwhile, My Daily suggests that "Selfies Aren't Good For Your Health." (2014) and CNN published a video on March 11, 2015, asking "Are selfies causing people to go under the knife?" The Guardian 's Jonathan Freedland, argued in opposition in 2013 that "The selfie's screaming narcissism masks an urge to connect," positioning this view as the alternative in popular culture. What makes the negative view even more dangerous is how it quickly became associated with women because selfie culture is most often considered to be a female-dominated practice.

Selfie researcher, Anne L. Burns, argues that, "online commentary about the use and nature of selfies has a regulatory social function in that there is a connection between the discursive construction of selfie practice and the negative perception of selfie takers" (2015, p. 1716). Furthermore, Burns writes, the selfie is "discursively constructed as a gendered practice" (Burns, 2015, p. 1718). Often, the term "narcissism" is used in describing the negative perception, and selfie-takers are accused of displaying narcissistic behaviours. Cultural theorist Imogen Tyler asserts that "the accusation of narcissism was mobilized in the 1970s to denigrate identity politics and forms of sexual behaviour deemed counter-normative..." (357). Before the 1970s, narcissism was considered to be a personality disorder- Narcissistic Personality Disorder- and was a term used medically rather than socially or culturally.

Art historians Brodsky and Olin summarize the valuable contributions of the women belonging to the 1970s feminist art movement during the time of the cultural shifting of "narcissism":

... feminist artists devised innovative representational strategies to challenge phallocentrism and the male gaze, illuminate female sexuality and eroticism, critique visual economies that limit women to heterosexual and maternal identities, and celebrate modes of existence that transcend patriarchy and white supremacy. (Brodsky and Olin, 2008, p. 329)

Despite the discursive construction explored by Burns, women have persisted in using the selfie as a feminist communication tool much like the female artists of the 1970s Feminist Art Movement, and have used it to enter a social-political space. Another selfie movement began in China in summer 2014, and is gaining more popularity in the United States. Women in China posted selfies with hair that is typically expected to be removed on a woman's body.

Many girls posted underarm hair selfies, but some also posted leg hair selfies, which resulted in the American Tumblr account, the Hairy Legs Club. More recently, in the United States, the underarm hair movement has shifted to become what one Instagram account calls, "Lady Pit Selfies."

As you can see in this photo, one girl dyed her underarm hair pink, matching the rest of her arm. Another photo shows blue underarm hair, while another shows the hair decorated with tiny flowers

It is certainly an interesting play on the dominant view of a feminine underarm, and sends a clear message- hair removal is not necessary to be feminine or identify as a woman. Popular fashion blogger, the Man Repeller, points out that dyed underarm hair is becoming trendy as a new take on how "Women have championed bodily hair growth in response to the stereotypes of patriarchy for years."

A similar campaign also initiated in summer 2014 greatly increased in popularity after supermodel Chrissy Teigen posted a selfie to her Instagram page in the spring of 2015. The Sports Illustrated model posted a photo of her inner thighs, posing cross-legged, commenting that her "Stretchies say hi!" (referencing her stretch marks) on April 13, 2015. Being a model, Teigan's job is supported by her body as object, which makes her stretch mark selfie all the more influential. Her body, normally a commodified object and symbol of the ideal cisgender woman's body, becomes an object of a feminist selfie. This selfie coincides with the summer 2014 Instagram account, @loveyourlines, dedicated to celebrating women's stretch marks, and responsible for the stretch mark selfie campaign.

As of July 2015, the account already had over 130 000 followers on Instagram, excluding the followers of the account's Tumblr site. Women submit photos of their stretch marks, which are then displayed publicly on this account, in the same way that @ladypithair accepts international submissions of body hair selfies. Many of the submitted photos to the Love Your Lines movement display the stretch marks left after pregnancy and childbirth, which are exclusively cisgender female experiences.

Sharing these post-pregnancy bellies generates a discussion of the everyday female body and breaks down the concept of the ideal cisgender female body.

Contemporary photographer Ina Loewenberg argues that, for women in particular, engaging in "self-portraiture is a way to keep control of their own representation" (1999). This feminist movement in selfie culture mimics the sexual liberation of women and the female body from the 1970s feminist art movement. These selfie campaigns also speak to the novelty of the selfie as an updated Polaroid, using the instantaneousness of the smart phone and the archiving capabilities of social media platforms to enter a social-political space. There are arguably thousands of selfies that are not consciously taken with this intent; however, selfie culture as a movement inherently challenges identity and gender representation, and the selfie deserves to be explored as both the object and political practice of this online feminist movement.

[1] Ironically, the Huffington Post has a number of articles reporting on selfie campaigns, such as the no makeup selfie campaign, and they are linked below Packer's article.

Besleyici, H. N. [@iciyelsebzanlzh]. (2014, July 29). Hello Bülent Arınç kahkaham nasıl. [Tweet]. Retrieved from https://twitter.com/iciyelsebzanlzh/status/494066686962962433

Brodsky, J.K. and Olin, F. (2008). Stepping out of the beaten path: Reassessing the feminist art. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 33(2), 329-342. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/521062

Burns, A.L. (2015). Self(ie)-discipline: Social regulation as enacted through the discussion of photographic practice. International Journal of Communication, 9, 1716-1733.

Buse, P. (2010). Polaroid into digital: Technology, cultural form, and the social practices of snapshot photography. Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, 24(2), 215-230. DOI: 10.1080/10304310903363864

CNN (2015, March 11). Are selfies causing people to go under the knife? CNN. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2015/03/11/dailyshare-selfie-plastic-surgery.hln/video/playlists/plastic-surgery/

Freedland, J. (2013, November 19). The selfie's screaming narcissism masks an urge to connect. The Guardian. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/19/selfie-narcissism-oxford-dictionary-word

Hairy Legs Club. (2015). [Tumblr Blog]. Retrieved from: http://hairylegsclub.tumblr.com

Hebblethwaite, C. (2014, July 28). #BBCtrending: The women having a laugh in Turkey. BBC News. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-28548179

Jennings, S. (2014, April 5). Are all those selfies making us narcissists? News Herald. Retrieved from http://www.news-herald.com/general-news/20140405/are-all-those-selfies-making-us-narcissists

Kansu, E. [@esrakansu]. (2014, July 30). I'm a Turkish girl, 26 years old, and I can't do anything but Smile!! #kahkaha #direnkahkaha #Bulentarinc. [Tweet]. Retrieved from https://twitter.com/esrakansu/status/494448593495789568

Lady Pit Hair. [@ladypithair]. (2014, July). Cute candy pink pits and hair [lollipop emoji] @vladimirthevampire #ladypithair #hairypitsclub #hairriot #pithairdontcare #bodypositivity #bodyposi #feminist #feminism #pitkittens #personalchoice #armpithairdontcare #endbodyshaming #smashthepatriarchy #furryfemme #pinkpits #dyedpits. [Instagram Photo]. Retrieved from https://instagram.com/p/qCtRKVkL7T/

Lady Pit Hair. [@ladypithair]. (2014, January). how to decorate your pits pt 1 by @catcoule. if dying your pits seems too permanent there are other ways to spruce up your #pittens for the holidays. #ladypithair @armpithairdontcare #feminism #feminist #freeyourpits #bodyhair #bodypositive #hairriot #decorateyourpits #flowerpits [Instagram Photo]. Retrieved from https://instagram.com/p/wUAE2AELyz/

Loewenberg, I. (1999). Reflections on self-portraiture in photography." Feminist Studies, 25(2), 398-408.

Love Your Lines. [@loveyourlines]. (2015, July). 24 year old mum of a 2 year old little girl. At first, I hated my lines! But now I have realized there's nothing I can do about them. I have learned [Instagram]. Retrieved from https://instagram.com/p/5Kh3IfFvMS/

Love Your Lines. [@loveyourlines]. (2015, July). "for years I have been embarrassed and afraid of people seeing my lines. although I still wear shorts to pools and beaches, I am slowly [Instagram]. Retrieved from https://instagram.com/p/5sILdVlvAH/

Medine, L. (2015). All hail the technicolour armpit. The Man Repeller. Retrieved from http://www.manrepeller.com/2015/01/dyed-armpit-hair-trend.html

O'Connor, A. (2014, August 1). Emma Watson joins laughing protest against Turkish Deputy Prime Minister. Retrieved from: http://www.dailyedge.ie/emma-watson-laughing-campaign-turkey-1600470-Aug2014/

Oxford Dictionaries. (2013, November 18). Oxford Dictionaries word of the year 2013. [Oxford Words Blog]. Retrieved from http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2013/11/word-of-the-year-2013-winner/

Packer, J. (2014, August 21). Selfies Are Entertaining But They're Not Journalism. The Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/jon-packer/selfies_b_5696136.html

Rutledge, P. (2013, April 18). #Selfies: Narcissism or self-exploration? Psychology Today. Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/positively-media/201304/selfies-narcissism-or-self-exploration

Schroeder, A. (2014, August 4). In China, women are showing off their armpit hair on social media. Retrieved from: http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/china-weibo-armpit-hair-selfie/selfie. (2014, February 20). In Oxford Dictionaries Online. Retrieved from http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/selfie

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Senft, T. and Baym, N. (2015). What does the selfie say? Investigating a global phenomenon, International Journal of Communication, 9, 1588-1606.

Stewart. E. (2014). Selfies aren't good for your health. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/08/14/why-selfies-aren-t-good-for-your- health_n_7333220.html

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Women and Selfie Culture: the Selfie as a Feminist Communication Tool

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Lianna Pisani, Master of Arts in Communication and Culture, Ryerson and York Universities This presentation examines how women use the selfie through technologies of smart phones and social media as a communication tool to challenge oppressive political statements and ideologies.

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Opinion: if selfies are emblematic of modern trends, they are also symptomatic of major changes which have redefined Western societies.
Tens of thousands of years ago, our early ancestors began to draw on the walls of caves. Some of these images still survive, scattered across Eurasia in places like La Pasiega in Spain and Maros in Indonesia. Despite their different geographic locations, these ancient paintings share striking similarities. Firstly, their existence illustrates the human impulse for creativity and the desire to represent ourselves and the world across time and culture. Secondly, it is notable and moving that so many cave paintings feature stencils of the human hand, a type of primitive signature that says "I was here".

It may seem odd to open a piece on the selfie phenomenon with reference to Paleolithic cave paintings. After all, the selfie is in many respects new, a text and practice enabled by digital technologies which are quickly reshaping our social, political and private lives.

It is also ubiquitous and easy to produce, hardly comparable to a precious historical artefact. Yet to fully understand the phenomenon's popularity, we also need to consider factors that are decidedly not new, factors rooted in the human motivation to express and record the things that matter most to us.
From RTÉ Radio One's Ryan Tubridy Show, Mary McGill discusses if selfies are just a harmless fad or if they are in fact proof of society's worsening narcissism
This motivation is made all the more poignant by the fact that life is fleeting, change inevitable. Hence, as theorists like Roland Barthes have argued, it is unsurprising that we turn to photography as a means of preserving what we hold dear and staying connected to those we have lost.

One way of exploring the selfie phenomenon is as a new form of personal photography. It is a form which is much maligned, regularly evoked as a damning example of our narcissistic age. As a practice, it is, by definition, focused on the self, a preoccupation that is variously cast as wasteful, silly, even pathological. As British journalist Grace Dent puts it, "selfies are a mindless act available every time we need to be mindful."

Yet if selfies are emblematic of worrying modern trends, they are also symptomatic of major changes which redefined Western societies over the course of the 20th century. These include increasing industrialisation along with the rise of mass media and consumer culture in which images are a powerful commodity.

You never know who might photobomb your selfie

Collectively, these developments shaped, and continue to influence, the norms and cultures which govern our lives. Since its inception, photography has been integral to this process. As a pastime, it helped form models of travel and domesticity through the family photograph album. In advertising, it attempts to stimulate and reflect desire.

As a method of surveillance, photography has been used to justify deeply dubious notions of difference, helping to create classes of people deemed "other" or "deviant". Hence, far from being frivolous, the selfie phenomenon emerges from a history that is complex, marked by inequality and myth-making.

A key characteristic of modernity is an increased emphasis on the individual as the unit through which people experience the world, as opposed to the family or the community. Under neoliberalism, individualism has been further elevated, particularly those kinds of individualism that harbour an "entrepreneurial spirit". For example, it is unsurprising that some of the most visible selfie-takers are the likes of the Kardashians who have built an empire by harnessing the commercial potential of social media through their astute use of femininity and its associated labour.
From RTÉ Radio One's Arena, Evelyn O'Rourke on the trend for selfies amongst celebrities, politicians and ordinary mortals
Taking the rise of individualism into account, claims of narcissism regarding the selfie need to be carefully unpacked and contextualised. At a glance, it is impossible to tell which selfies are indicative of healthy self-esteem and those which might be classified as concerning. This is something to keep in mind when simplistic notions of vanity or self-obsession are offered as an explanation for the phenomenon's appeal.

In my research, excessive selfie-taking is often interpreted by participants not as narcissistic but as a sign of low self-worth. It is also worth noting that narcissism can have gendered implications. As cultural scholars have shown, it is a charge which is all too readily applied to women's attempts to represent themselves in the public sphere. Again, this is not new: Victorian women cyclists faced similar criticism, as did the earliest female artists. While narcissism is an element of the phenomenon that should not be discounted, neither should it be assumed without judiciousness.

Mary McGill's TEDxGalway talk on Young Women, Narcissism and the Selfie Phenomenon

One key aspect of the selfie's appeal is the degree of control it gives people over their image. Once again, this notion of control can be understood as a part of a long tradition. After all, a key tenet of personal photography since its inception is that it enables people to depict themselves, " as they would wish to be seen" as Patricia Holland describes it in "Sweet it is to scan: personal photographs and popular photography" from Photography: A Critical Introduction ( Routledge, 2015)

How we represent ourselves depends on a myriad of factors, including our culture, personal taste, socio-economic standing and so on. It is also a highly selective process, as anyone who has flicked through a family photograph album or scrolled Instagram can attest. While selfie-practices make the doing of personal photography easier, the motivations and narratives which fuel our impulse to represent ourselves remain complicated as ever.

In our rush to explain new phenomena like the selfie, we can come to rely on simplistic explanations which belie complex histories and the role of subjective experiences. Selfies may not be for everyone, but they speak to important issues like identity, representation and what it means to be human in the 21st century. As such, the phenomenon deserves careful attention that draws not just from the present, but also from the richness of the past.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ

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How selfies show what it means to be human in the 21st century

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Opinion: if selfies are emblematic of modern trends, they are also symptomatic of major changes which have redefined Western societies. Tens of thousands of years ago, our early ancestors began to draw on the walls of caves. Some of these images still survive, scattered across Eurasia in places like La Pasiega in Spain and Maros in Indonesia.

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Age and Gender Differences

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Selfie tips for more likes easily available online

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Belonging

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Belonging

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Loneliness

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Humans are more connected to each other than ever, thanks to smartphones, the web and social media. At the same time, loneliness is a huge and growing social problem.

Why is this so? Research shows social media use alone can't cure loneliness - but it can be a tool to build and strengthen our genuine connections with others, which are important for a happy life.

To understand why this is the case, we need to understand more about loneliness, its harmful impact, and what this has to do with social media.

The scale of loneliness

There is great concern about a loneliness epidemic in Australia. In the 2018 Australian Loneliness Report, more than one-quarter of survey participants reported feeling lonely three or more days a week.

Studies have linked loneliness to early mortality, increased cardio-vascular disease, poor mental health and depression, suicide, and increased social and health care costs.

But how does this relate to social media?

Read more: How to be a healthy user of social media

More and more Australians are becoming physically isolated. My previous research demonstrated that face-to-face contact in Australia is declining, and this is accompanied by a rise in technology-enabled communication.

Enter social media, which for many is serving as a replacement for physical connection. Social media influences nearly all relationships now.

Navigating the physical/digital interface

While there is evidence of more loneliness among heavy social media users, there is also evidence suggesting social media use decreases loneliness among highly social people.

How do we explain such apparent contradictions, wherein both the most and least lonely people are heavy social media users?

Research reveals social media is most effective in tackling loneliness when it is used to enhance existing relationships, or forge new meaningful connections. On the other hand, it is counterproductive if used as a substitute for real-life social interaction.

Thus, it is not social media itself, but the way we integrate it into our existing lives which impacts loneliness.

I wandered lonely in the cloud

While social media's implications for loneliness can be positive, they can also be contradictory.

Tech-industry enthusiasts highlight social media's benefits, such as how it offers easy, algorithimically-enhanced connection to anyone, anywhere in the world, at any time. But this argument often ignores the quality of these connections.

Psychologist Robert Weiss makes a distinction between "social loneliness" - a lack of contact with others - and "emotional loneliness", which can persist regardless of how many "connections" you have, especially if they do not provide support, affirm identity and create feelings of belonging.

Read more: A month at sea with no technology taught me how to steal my life back from my phone

Without close, physical connections, shallow virtual friendships can do little to alleviate emotional loneliness. And there is reason to think many online connections are just that.

Evidence from past literature has associated heavy social media use with increased loneliness. This may be because online spaces are often oriented to performance, status, exaggerating favourable qualities (such as by posting only "happy" content and likes), and frowning on expressions of loneliness.

On the other hand, social media plays a vital role in helping us stay connected with friends over long distances, and organise catch-ups. Video conferencing can facilitate "meetings" when physically meeting is impractical.

Platforms like Facebook and Instagram can be used to engage with new people who may turn into real friends later on. Similarly, sites like Meetup can help us find local groups of people whose interests and activities align with our own.

And while face-to-face contact remains the best way to help reduce loneliness, help can sometimes be found through online support groups.

Why so lonely?

There are several likely reasons for our great physical disconnection and loneliness.

We've replaced the 20th century idea of stable, permanent careers spanning decades with flexible employment and gig work. This prompts regular relocation for work, which results in disconnection from family and friends.

The way we build McMansions (large, multi-room houses) and sprawl our suburbs is often antisocial, with little thought given to developing vibrant, walkable social centres.

Read more: Size does matter: Australia's addiction to big houses is blowing the energy budget

Single-person households are expected to increase from about 2.1 million in 2011 to almost 3.4 million in 2036.

All of the above means the way we manage loneliness is changing.

In our book, my co-authors and I argue people manage their feelings differently than in the past. Living far from friends and family, isolated individuals often deal with negative emotions alone, through therapy, or through connecting online with whoever may be available.

Social media use is pervasive, so the least we can do is bend it in a way that facilitates our real-life need to belong.

It is a tool that should work for us, not the other way around. Perhaps, once we achieve this, we can expect to live in a world that is a bit less lonely.

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Does social media make us more or less lonely? Depends on how you use it

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Humans are more connected to each other than ever, thanks to smartphones, the web and social media. At the same time, loneliness is a huge and growing social problem. Why is this so? Research shows social media use alone can't cure loneliness - but it can be a tool to build and strengthen our genuine connections with others, which are important for a happy life.

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Loneliness

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It is often said that it's lonely at the top, but loneliness on the job is a growing issue well beyond the corner office.

American workers are feeling more isolated, and younger workers are experiencing loneliness more so than their older co-workers, according to a new Cigna study.

Three out of every five adults, or 61%, report that they sometimes or always feel lonely, according to the second annual Cigna U.S. Loneliness Index, which is based on a survey of 10,000 adults. That's up 7 percentage points from the 54% reading reported from the company's first loneliness survey a year ago.

The numbers remain even higher for younger adults. Among workers aged 18-22, known as Gen Z, 73% report sometimes or always feeling alone, up from 69% a year ago.

"We had a hypothesis that society - the U.S. specifically - was dealing with an elevated level of loneliness, disconnection," explained Cigna CEO David Cordani. "We can start to see those disconnections manifest themselves in other health issues showing up for individuals ... whether you think about it through the lens of depression, stress ... or more heavy, complex behavioral issues."

One reason why younger people may feel more isolated, may be their greater tendency to use social media. The study found an increasing correlation between social media usage and feelings of loneliness. Seven out of 10 heavy social media users, 71%, reported feelings of loneliness, up from 53% a year ago. That compares to 51% of light social media users feeling lonely, up from 47% a year ago.

Another reason younger people may feel more alienated could have to do with being at the bottom rung of the employment ladder.

Nearly two-thirds of workers who'd been at a job less than six months reported experiencing isolation, compared to just 40% workers who've been with a firm for 10 years or more.

Entry-level workers scored significantly higher on the Cigna Loneliness index than experienced workers, middle managers and executives. More than half felt there's no one at work they can turn to.

But it is just as lonely at the top of the ladder. Fifty-six percent of senior executives reported feeling there's no one they can talk to, with 69% saying that no one really knows them well.

"They're more isolated from other employees. If we think about the way to mitigate this - which is having coffee, having lunch with your co-workers - that's not a typical workplace culture for a lot of senior executives," said Cigna Chief Medical Officer Dr. Douglas Nemecek. "So, it's something that we have to think about and work on."

When it comes to gender differences at work, men appear to feel much more isolated than women. Forty percent of men reported feeling a general sense of emptiness when they're at work, compared to 29% of women.

Overall, 63% of men reported feelings of loneliness in this year's survey, a ten-point increase from a year ago. For women, the increase was not as sharp; 58% of women reported loneliness this year, up from 54% a year ago.

Why are insurers like Cigna so focused on loneliness now?

"It typically comes from - just like everything in healthcare - you follow the dollar," said Greer Myers, Turn-Key Health CEO and a member of the Coalition to End Social Isolation & Loneliness.

The Trump administration has given Medicare plans greater flexibility to focus on the impact of social isolation on the health of older adults. Researchers from AARP and Stanford University found that the government spends more than $6.7 billion annually on additional medical costs for Medicare recipients who lack social contact.

The hope is that by addressing some of the so-called social determinants of health that contribute to isolation among seniors, Medicare can reduce spending on poor health.

"Everybody has always known isolation is a problem ... and people are figuring out how to deal with these particular issues as they affect the larger healthcare environment," said Myers.

Cigna researchers estimate that employees who feel socially isolated miss work as much as five times more than their connected co-workers due to stress, and are twice as likely as to think about quitting their jobs.

The insurer is advising companies to do greater outreach about mental health counseling to help workers deal with stress. It also has expanded virtual mental health services to make accessing care more convenient and attractive for younger workers.

Employers should also look for ways to promote greater in-person communication among workers, and programs that foster more connections like affinity groups and volunteer activities.

The study found that people who get more time interacting face to face with others at work feel less lonely or alienated. More than half of remote workers who telecommute, 58%, reported feeling left out at work.

So, is anybody feeling connected and not lonely at work? It turns out that older workers are the least lonely.

Baby Boomers and workers older than 72 are the most likely to feel that they generally have people they can turn to at work and really understand them, with only 18% reported feeling alienated on the job.

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Loneliness is on the rise and younger workers and social media users feel it most, Cigna survey finds

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It is often said that it's lonely at the top, but loneliness on the job is a growing issue well beyond the corner office. American workers are feeling more isolated, and younger workers are experiencing loneliness more so than their older co-workers, according to a new Cigna study.

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Social Media Anxiety

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Is Social Media Anxiety Real? | High Watch Recovery Center

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Social Anxiety Disrorder

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Social Media and Social Anxiety Disorder - Verywell Mindhttps--www.verywellmind.com › ... › Social …

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Reasons to do a digital detox

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Social Media Detox

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How to Take a Social Media Detox - Declutter The Mind

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Examples of Social Media Activism

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#LikeAGirl

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#LikeAGirl

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Always approached a social issue within a global marketing campaign

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#LikeAGirl

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Issues with Online Activism

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Online activism is dismantling barriers, but not for everyone

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Issues with Social Media Activism

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The Problem with Social Media Activism - The Startup - Medium

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Issues with Social Media Activism

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Why In-Person Protests Are Stronger Than Online Activism - The Atlantic

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Selfie Obsessions

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Taking the perfect selfie