Addressing Social Media’s Tyranny on Adolescent Perceptions of Their Bodies

By Daniel Wu Nov. 2, 2025

For the last 30 years, increased availability and use of social media have caused millions of adolescents to be exposed to thinness ideals. 67% of teens today say they use TikTok, with 16% of them saying they use it constantly. This marks a massive increase in teenage exposure to social media compared to the past. In just 2 years, the use of social media among teens has increased by 17%, surpassing the percent increase in four years prior.  However, there have been numerous studies documenting the negative impacts of social media use and body image dissatisfaction, a negative attitude towards one’s physical appearance.  Specifically, when social media broadcasts the sociocultural construct of body images, such standards of body images are eventually internalized by adolescents, altering their standards of an acceptable self.  This has been linked to dire consequences such as eating disorders, anxiety, and psychological distress. By examining the process through which adolescents develop body image dissatisfaction as a result of social media, stakeholders such as the government and social media companies can implement appropriate policies to alleviate the impact. Thus, this paper will examine the effects of social media on adolescent body dysmorphia and methods that the US government can employ to facilitate adolescent development. Ultimately, the US government should implement digital literacy courses into the current education curricula to ensure that adolescents learn the ability to discern risks, foster resilience on digital platforms, and rehabilitate from social media’s harmful effects on body image. 

The Influence of Social Media on Body Image 

Given its prevalence, it is often unsurprising to find out social media’s pervasive influence on the lives of adolescents. The mass media are powerful transmitters of societal messages such as beauty, weight, food, gender roles, and fashion through digitally altered images. In just one day, an average American encounters 3,000 advertisements, and spends two years of their lives watching TV commercials, during which they are exposed to social messages.  These societal messages condition people to be aspirational toward what they see on social media, impacting people’s overall self-perception and how people interact with others in life negatively. According to Festinger, an American social psychologist, in the absence of objective social criteria, people compare themselves to others to fulfill an inherent desire for self-evaluation. For instance, the number of followers, the number of “likes”, and comments posted on photos or videos that provide quantitative and qualitative information about the appreciation of others may be factors in the reason why people self-evaluate on social media. Furthermore, humans biologically tend to compare themselves with others due to a variety of different functions: fulfilling affiliation needs, regulating emotions, being inspired, and making decisions. Both of these factors conclusively substantiate Festinger’s theory of a biological desire for self-evaluation, which suggests an additional reason why humans internalize messages on social media.

However, Kenny and colleagues extend this perspective by noting that social media impacts adolescent girls and boys differently. Typically, adolescent girls are disproportionately focused on self-presentation, focusing on feedback indices such as “likes” and “comments” received on these social media platforms compared to their male counterparts. By contrast, boys have been found to view social media as having a motivating impact on their body image while girls felt that it worsened their body image. Despite the disparate perceptions of social media’s impact on adolescents, Griffiths, and colleagues note that due to boys’ tendencies to downplay male body images, social media’s impact on male adolescent body image may not be fully represented. This adds to the vulnerability of adolescents to body dissatisfaction from social media. In addition to their adolescent qualities, girls, being additionally vulnerable, should ensure that they remain protected.

While such biological tendencies universally apply regardless of the age group, the pervasiveness of social media has left younger age groups especially vulnerable to influences on self-perception from social media. A study by Lorraine Swords, an assistant professor of the School of Psychology, and associates published in the Irish Journal of Psychological Medicine notes that physical appearances are one of the greatest predictors of one’s self-worth: for girls, thinness is deemed as an ideal trait for peer acceptance. Therefore, if an adolescent’s self-evaluation of their physical appearance is unfavorable, their self-evaluation may exacerbate their body dissatisfaction. The findings established by Swords and her colleagues are further supported by an article authored by a professor at the College of Health and Human Services at the University of North Carolina which reports that this vulnerability overlaps with a critical period of physical change during adolescence. For adolescent girls, changes undergone during puberty such as widening of the hips and increases in adiposity may be seen as inconsistent with the cultural norm of the “thin body.” Such physical changes are a natural part of maturing girls in puberty and cannot be controlled. Therefore, when adolescents notice that their physical changes are misaligned with beauty standards, this makes them especially vulnerable to body image. Both authors act in conjunction with one another’s perspective to unveil the degree to which specific characteristics of adolescents make them especially vulnerable to experiencing body dissatisfaction. Indeed, the phase of puberty brings about inevitable changes to adolescents’ physical appearances, which in turn impacts their perception of their bodies. While this may suggest that biological developments in adolescents are predominantly responsible for body dissatisfaction, numerous experts have demonstrated time and again that social media exacerbates adolescents’ pre-existing beliefs about their own bodies. Therefore, governments must recognize the amplifying effects of social media on adolescents who already undergo stressful changes during their critical years of development and thus gear solutions that aim to reduce such adverse effects from online platforms. 

The Effects of Social Media on Body Image

Subsequent to the influences of social media on altering the body images of adolescents, the impacts of those changes are devastating. From a study conducted by the American Psychological Association on women with anorexia nervosa, an eating disorder that stems from a fear of gaining weight, perceptions of body images were strongly correlated to symptoms of anxiety. Gerada, a researcher at the University of Ottawa, further notes that adolescents with body image dissatisfaction experience elevated levels of anxiety compared to peers who are satisfied with their bodies. Both authors present a link between negative perceptions of the body and increased anxiety, illustrating that the effects of anxiety adolescents experience may stem from negative body images. As a product of such effects, an online survey by a British charity called the Mental Health Foundation found that thirty-five percent of teenagers felt worried about their body image.  

The effects of body image-induced anxiety are linked to a series of negative impacts on adolescents. Most notably, adolescents with anxiety disorders were less likely to make money and more likely to experience physical conditions such as hypertension. However, the effects of social media also impact adolescents psychologically as well: spending time looking at celebrities and peer images on Instagram leads to increased negative moods. Together, the joint physical and psychological effects of anxiety indicate the effects that social media can have on adolescents by causing anxiety. In the long term, these effects of anxiety evolve into Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). According to Zanette and her colleagues, life-threatening events, such as anxiety caused by negative body perceptions, can have enduring effects on the brain and behavior due to PTSD. In such life-threatening moments, animals typically show heightened sensitivity to predator cues and display increased time spent vigilant. Although anxiety and PTSD are different, they are similar due to the universal struggle that patients who suffer from PTSD and anxiety feel when attempting to suppress fear. Like how animals experiencing PTSD display behavioral changes, adolescents suffering from anxiety similarly exhibit defense mechanisms as a result of social media-induced anxiety. Cicchetti and Toth corroborate this assertion in a study published in the American Psychology Association’s journal which purported that adolescents may avoid social interaction out of a fear of rejection through avoidance strategies and consequently experience symptoms of anxiety. However, what is notable is that such behavioral changes are not temporary but rather long-lasting. Zanette emphasizes that given that PTSD is the cost of inheriting an evolutionary survival-based mechanism even if it may decrease the quality of life, behavioral changes are likely to be long-lasting. Hence, the collective perspective presented by Zanette and her colleagues and Cichetti and Toth demonstrate how fear translates to post-traumatic symptoms such as anxiety. In the current context, these experts suggest that fear that stems from body image insecurities can lead to the development of social anxiety and pathological symptoms among adolescents. Finally, when considering the long-lasting impacts of body image dissatisfaction, it becomes evident that governments and educational institutions should examine not only adolescents but also young adults to gain a holistic understanding of social media’s long-term consequences. 

Methods to Address Body Image Dissatisfaction Among Adolescents

As a solution to body dissatisfaction that plagues adolescents, governments can opt for digital media literacy programs for adolescents in educational environments. On a general note, digital media literacy interventions aim to equip students with the ability to critically evaluate what they consume on media through critical evaluation methods  such as the buffering of widespread influence of media messages by raising awareness of how media affects people, motivations beyond advertising, and ways to respond to media through advocacy such as discussions or demonstrations on manipulation techniques used by media to produce flawless, unrealistic human images. When implemented, digital media literacy has been found to have improved body perceptions even after time spent on social media. Beth Bell and her colleagues from the British Psychological Study found that adolescents who underwent Digital Bodies, a brief classroom-based intervention focusing on digital media literacy, reported improved body satisfaction and less social media ideal internalization. The exposure and vulnerability of adolescents to body dissatisfaction from a young age suggests that media literacy should also be taught from a young age. 

While the benefits of digital media literacy have been well documented, some remain skeptical of its feasibility. Wright notes, however, that media literacy programs rely on the assumption that a rational adolescent can resist potentially damaging media messages through self-determination. Contrary to this assumption, most adolescents cannot resist messages on social media at will. Another professor of sociology, Rebecca Coleman, identifies that the effects of body dissatisfaction may limit the agential capacities of adolescents, which may close off the implementation of digital media literacy programs. The lack of agential capacities of adolescents indicates that the fight against body dissatisfaction requires courage among adolescents: for adolescents to gain capacities to be satisfied with their bodies, they must be courageous enough to do so. Simone Biles, an American gymnast, points out that such courage starts from a position of vulnerability. For an action to be courageous, it must first be vulnerable. Therefore, digital media literacy courses must create opportunities for adolescents to be vulnerable by “look[ing] at [themselves] and hav[ing] “hard conversations” about their body image dissatisfaction. Only then can adolescents have the courage that allows them to overcome the agential barriers stated by Coleman.

Concluding Remarks

Social media’s grip on the lives of adolescents has significant influences on their lives. Through triggering perceptions of dissatisfaction with their body, adolescents experience a myriad of symptoms such as eating disorders, anxiety, and an inability to form relationships. Until governments manage to fix how adolescents engage with messages they see on social media, the prevalence of body dissatisfaction will only continue its tyranny over the lives of adolescents. If we teach adolescents to be vulnerable and be more aware of misleading ideals perpetuated by the media, perhaps adolescents can use social media without the temptation to feel bad about the way they are.

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