The ‘Mirror Syndrome’: young female university students’ reactions to beauty influencers’ activity on Instagram

This dissertation has aimed to assess, explore, describe and explain how the actions of beauty influencers through Instagram could contribute to the triggering of Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD) in young female users of the mentioned social networking site. Theoretically, it adopted an interdisciplinary approach that integrated a psychological, communicational, legal and educational perspective. Methodologically, using a mixed-methods approach, the study population comprised 459 young female university students between 18 and 25 years old from five continents who answered an online questionnaire, and the data collected was analysed using the software NVivo 12. The results revealed that participants had a firmly shared perception of Western beauty canons, the pressure they felt to conform to them, and the challenges paired with trying to meet them, leading to frustration and feelings of inadequacy for not looking as beautiful as beauty influencers on Instagram do even while recognising these actions and situations could negatively affect their health and general well-being. This research underscored that these factors could potentially contribute to the development of BDD in young women, calling for further exploration into the broader implications of Instagram usage.

Dissertation: https://hdl.handle.net/11370/a1c5a48c-422f-4a36-9f90-b18ddf9b45e6