If we went back a couple of years to analyze the big trends in culture we’d certainly have highlighted the selfies phenomena as a major one. Indeed, the number of searches for the term selfie on the internet increased 2.166% in the last year. This should come as no surprise when even the pope and the president of the United States are taking selfies themselves. One single search for the word selfie on Instagram results in over 230 million images.
Why and how have selfies become such an expressive aspect of our culture? And what does it say about us and our times?
Some will say that we selfies show how narcissistic we have become while others will argue that they are just a harmless way of having fun. Whether we love them or hate them, they are surely able to provide us with some insights about ourselves.
The word selfie isn’t so new. Back in 2002, it was already used at an australian forum to describe a photograph taken of oneself, and the first selfie in history dates back to 1839, when a photographer called Robert Cornelius took a photo of himself.
The Oxford dictionary annually chooses one “word of the year”. The choice is made by a group of linguists, and the word chosen is rarely unanimous. That wasn’t the case in 2013, when “selfie” was picked as the most expressive word that year.
Keith Campbell, professor of psychology at the University of Georgia, consider selfies to be just a form of creative expression that is no different from the artists self portraits. One great appeal of these modern self portraits is that they have many platforms where they can be shown, allowing us to have greater control of how and how much the world sees us.
On the other hand, selfies can make us more dependable on others’ approval of ourselves and therefore it can cause us to become more social dependents. In a world where our goals towards success are already high, it adds pressure for us to achieve unrealistic perfection. And the pursuit for perfection can be related to low self-esteem.
That said, it’s easy to understand how addiction to selfies can be directly proportional to a low image of oneself. It’s a strategy that is often reinforced and rewarded by others, thus making us run the risk of developing an unreal self image that can be perpetuated for as long as we let it be.
The problem is that, as with any addiction, it’s hard to realize when it starts becoming harmful and it’s hard to stop.
Being too concerned about who sees the published pictures and how many likes you get is a symptom that it’s becoming more than a simple tool for self expression, but it’s turning into an unhealthy activity.
Ultimately, there’s nothing bad about selfies themselves, and they can eventually even work to uplift us. The problem is when they become the standard form of evaluating ourselves. There are many ways by which we can build a positive self esteem - through work, through our emotional relationships, etc. - and letting our controlled image in social media become paramount is fueling a self dependence on others approval of they way we look rather than on the way we see ourselves.
You can read more about how selfies can be linked to narcissism, low self-esteem and even mental illness here.
