Adolescents and social media: The effects of frequency of use, self-presentation, social comparison, and self esteem on possible self imagery

Abstract

Introduction: American adolescents continue to show a strong social media presence. This presence entails consistent monitoring of how they present themselves, and how that presentation compares to others, which in turn impacts the versions of the self they share with others. These versions include their hoped for (e.g. high academic achiever) or feared selves (e.g. inconsistent academic achiever) which have been referred to as possible selves. Here, we explored the contributions of social media use, self-presentation, social comparison, and self-esteem on adolescents' reflection of their possible selves. We also examined age as a factor to determine whether early and late adolescents reflect on and craft their social media presence in similar fashions. Ideally, all adolescents would seek to share a balance of possible selves whereby their social media presence includes both a hoped for self and a feared self in the same aspect of their lives (e.g. academic achievement and failure). These balances have been linked to positive outcomes in offline contexts. Methods: We explored the relative contributions of age, self-esteem, social media use, online self-presentation behaviors, and online social comparison tendencies to the ideation of balanced possible selves among 152 adolescents aged 11 to 18 years (55.9% female). We also included an exploratory analysis of gender differences within the content of possible selves reported. Results: The results of a sequential regression analysis, regressing the balance of possible selves on each of the independent variables, yielded no significant differences. A chi square analysis, however, revealed differences among males and females in the content of feared selves as female participants reported more feared selves involving interpersonal relationships than males. Conclusion: Further exploration of possible selves in the digital context is warranted given our findings that adolescent females, in particular, focus on interpersonal relationships as they develop their self-esteem and self-concept.