Social Comparison Theory

Abstract

This study uses social comparison theory and concepts of self-evaluation to study the relation between Instagram’s “fitspiration” posts and viewers’ motivation to improve their lifestyle or to exercise and viewer’s self-esteem and body satisfaction. A cross-sectional survey was distributed on a sample of young Instagram users between the ages of 18-25. The participants answered questions that inform us about their frequency of Instagram use and fitspiration content consumption, their intention to exercise based on the Exercise Motivation Index (EMI2, Markland & Psychol, 1999), their tendency to compare their appearance, and self-esteem using the State Appearance Self-Esteem Scale (SSES, Heatherton & Polivy, 1991), their levels of body satisfaction using the Body Image State Scale (BISS, Cash et al. 2002). In line with previous studies, this study showed a positive relationship between fitspiration consumption and motivation and a negative one between fitspiration consumption and self-esteem and body satisfaction. These relations were found to be mediated by social comparison tendency. Moreover, the study asserted that different types of fitspiration are associated with each studied trait differently. This study adds to the existing literature on social media, especially in the Middle East, with contributions to the application of the social comparison theory. With the scarce research in this region, this study fills the gap of knowledge about the psychological correlations that Instagram consumption may have on young Lebanese users. The significance of this study lies in the understanding of the dimensions that the social comparison tendency may have on users’ confidence and motivation levels and raises awareness on the association between Instagram use and body image and eating disorders. It also adds to existing research on social comparison tendency giving it newly found data with a local scope of Lebanon during the turmoil of crisis that the citizens are going through.