Effects Of Social Comparison On Self

Effects of Social Comparison on Self

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Comparing oneself with someone else who seems to be doing better or worse than we are

in relation to beauty, wealth, success or even brainpower has been the norm in the society we

live in today. Everyone at one point tends to compare himself/herself with others to determine

their worth, their position in society or even status (Buunk et al, 1990). In a group setting, this is

called social comparison. This excerpt is purposed to discuss the effects of social comparison on

self. Using Instagram exposure time of three groups i.e. upward comparison group, downward

comparison group and the control group to compare and make conclusions on the its effect on

self. The hypothesis of the study was ‘Instagram as a social comparison platform has effect on

self.’ From the results obtained, it was found that actually Instagram as a social comparison

platform had no effects on self thus the hypothesis was not supported.

Method, procedure and results

51 Participants - 19 male and 32 female - were invited between the age of 19 and 25, all

college students who participated for extra credit. Participants used their own Instagram accounts

without limit to time. The results of their exposure to three distinct categories were subjected to

the Rosenberg self-esteem scale. These categories included the downward comparison group, the

control group and the upward comparison group each group with 17 participants. Participants in

the upward comparison group spent M = 11.59 (SD = 5.72) minutes in the Instagram task,

participants in the downward comparison group spent M = (SD =) minutes in the task and those

in the control group spent M = (SD =) minutes in the task. These means were not significantly

different, F(2,43) = 1.79, p > .05. The procedure used for this study included getting information

on the participants Instagram use and their views on its effect on self-esteem and information

uploaded in the Medialab software. It also incuded manipulation of the profile content to suit the

pre-determined results of each group and express upward and downward comparative

information (Vogel et al, 2014). For the downward comparison category, participants were

exposed to information content of people who were least off compared to them. The control

group on the other hand was allowed to read content of people who had pretty much the same

level of achievements and status. The upward comparison group was subjected to information

and content of persons who had made it in life, way better than themselves. At the end of the

study period, their reaction to the content provided in Instagram was obtained by asking a simple

question based on the Rosenberg self-esteem scale: Likert - 0 to 3. Like “I feel that I am a person

of worth at least on an equal plane to others” and “All in all, I am inclined to feel that I am a

failure” (Vogel et al, 2014).

From the experiment, the downward comparison received fewer likes and it was expected

of the group to have a high self-esteem because of the feeling of being better. The control group

received some relative number of likes but not as low as those of the downward comparison

hence it was expected of them to have a moderate self-esteem. The last group, the upward

comparison group received the most likes of profile content they were involved and was

expected to show the lowest self-esteem of the three groups. The impact of the profile content

manipulation was subjected to ANOVA test and the results obtained (F = 1.785 at p > 0.5)

showed that there was no significant difference in the participant experience with the varied

content exposure.

Limitations and suggestions for future research

The study experienced a number of limiting factors such as few numbers of willing

participants. Also the participants were all college students which do not reflect on the true

representation of the society. For future work, a sizeable number of participants would be of

great assistance in testing for self – esteem which may have a significant difference on the results

obtained.

Conclusion

From the study, it was evident that the hypothesis was not supported by the results;

Instagram as a social comparison platform had no effects on self. ANOVA and Rosenberg tests

were used to test for significance difference in experience after exposure to the different

categories of social comparison groups. Although the 51 participants used were able to give

substantive results, they were not sufficient.

Reference

Vogel E.A., Rose J.P., Roberts L.R. and Eckles K. (2014). Social comparison, Social Media, and

Self-Esteem. Psychology of popular media culture. Vol. 3, No. 4, 206 – 222.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000047

Buunk B.P., Collins R.L., Taylor S.E., Vanyperen N.W. and Dakof G.A. (1990). The affective

consequences of social comparison: Either direction has its ups and downs. Journal of

personality and social psychology. Vol. 59, No. 6, 1238-1249.

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Effects of social comparison on self

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