Selfie behavior and cosmetic surgery consideration in adolescents: the mediating roles of physical appearance comparisons and facial appearance concern.

Selfie activity may contribute to the acceptance of cosmetic surgery in adolescents, although few empirical studies exist. Based on social comparison theory, this study examined the association between selfie behavior and cosmetic surgery consideration among Chinese adolescents and further tested the possible mediating roles of social comparison and facial appearance concern in this relationship. A sample of 537 adolescents (339 girls and 198 boys) were recruited voluntarily to complete questionnaires on selfie behavior, upward physical appearance comparison, facial appearance concern and cosmetic surgery consideration. Linear regression and mediation analyses were conducted. The results showed that selfie behavior predicted higher level of adolescents' cosmetic surgery consideration. Moreover, this relationship was sequentially mediated through upward physical appearance comparison and facial appearance concern. These findings expand the existent literature by suggesting that selfie behavior may trigger upward social comparison in adolescents, which in turn increase their acceptance of cosmetic surgery.

Effect of manipulating facial attractiveness judgements on the experience of intrusive thoughts in high facial appearance concern individuals.

Elevated facial appearance concern is characterised by highly frequent and distressing intrusive thoughts about appearance. Recent evidence suggests that enhanced readiness to make attractive (rather than unattractive) judgements of one's own and others' faces is associated with reduced experiencing of intrusive thoughts in high facial appearance concern individuals. The current study sought to experimentally evaluate the causal nature of this relationship. Females with high facial appearance concern (N = 123) completed the novel Judgement Dimension Manipulation (JDM) under conditions that required making 'attractive' judgments (i.e., only attractive faces were judged in terms of their attractiveness) or 'unattractive' judgments (i.e., only unattractive faces were judged in terms of their attractiveness). Prior to, and following the manipulation, participants completed a measure of intrusion frequency. Results revealed that the JDM was effective in inducing differential facial attractiveness judgements across the two groups and that this, in turn, impacted on intrusion frequency. Specifically, participants that were instructed to make 'attractive' judgments exhibited reduced intrusion frequency. These findings suggest that making attractive judgements of one's own and others' faces causally impacts on the experience of appearance-related intrusive thoughts and implicate that targeting this process may have potential therapeutic value.

The role of biases in the judgement processing of (un)attractive faces in body dysmorphic symptomatology.

The current study tested the novel hypothesis that elevated facial appearance concern reflects a heightened tendency to judge facial appearance in terms of attractiveness, rather than in terms of attractiveness-irrelevant dimensions. Seventy-three females, reporting either high or low facial appearance concerns, were exposed to an individualised stimulus development protocol which involved a photoshoot and the subsequent selection of photographs perceived to be most and least attractive. Participants were then required to judge photographs in terms of either attractiveness or the eye gaze direction of the individual in the photograph. Results revealed that when judging attractiveness, low facial concern participants were faster to classify photographs as belonging to the attractive category rather than the unattractive category. We termed this potentially protective bias the General Attractiveness Recognition Advantage. Moreover, regardless of judgement required, high facial concern participants were faster to make responses to unattractive relative to attractive photographs of themselves. We termed this potential vulnerability bias the Efficient Processing of Unattractive Self. Further analyses revealed that the former bias associated with broader body dysmorphic symptomatology. The current findings, although inconsistent with the hypothesis under test, were novel in revealing two distinct mechanisms which distinguished high and low facial appearance concern individuals.