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Men think women who post sexy selfies on social media cheapen themselves, research suggests
The study, ‘Visual intimacy on social media: from selfies to the co-construction of intimacies through shared pictures’, conducted by Dr Cristina Miguel a Senior Lecturer in the School of Strategy, Marketing and Communication at Leeds Beckett, explored the kind of pictures participants aged 25-49 years considered to be intimate and whether they post them through social media platforms.
The research, which looked at two platforms – Facebook and dating site Badoo - considered the choice of photos, often portraits and selfies, that people disclosed in order to represent themselves on either given network as well as the sharing of personal and intimate photos between users too.
Dr Miguel, who undertook the study as part of her PhD research at the University of Leeds, said: “Using in-depth interviews and user profile analysis conducted between March 2013 and February 2014, the aim of my research was to understand the roles of public photographs in different types of relationships across two distinct social media platforms, Badoo and Facebook, and in two European cities: Barcelona and Leeds.
“Some participants referred to Badoo when discussing the topic of intimacy in public through social media, mainly in relation to sexy selfies. In this study, participants did not include sexy selfies in their Badoo profiles, nevertheless they identified it as a common practice in the platform. A few male participants commented on how female Badoo users engage in ‘self-sexualisation’—a practice that they consider cheapens them. These participants expressed their lack of interest in female users who upload sexy pictures because they did not seem intellectual or because they did not seem ‘respectable.’
“In the same vein, since female users are often blamed for ‘slut-shaming’ – where women are called to task for their sexuality - in this study, the female participants reported keeping their sexy selfies to a minimum, especially on Facebook, due to the wider audiences they interact with through this platform. While some male participants had pictures in a bathing suit on Facebook, they did not consider these to be intimate and were not concerned about their distribution.
Dr Miguel added that the use of smartphones had boosted the popularity of people taking self-portraits in front of a mirror or selfies at arm’s length and that context affects the interpretation of the pictures. She said her findings suggested that the patriarchal gender roles have not changed, and are reproduced online because participants take their social/cultural assumptions online with them.
“I targeted Badoo and Facebook users aged 25-49 years because there is little research about online self-disclosure and intimacy practices among adults,” explained Dr Miguel. “It is further based on users’ perspectives of their own concept of intimate pictures in the context of social media. Images claim attention from users, and signify intimacy, with regard to sexual orientation and the level of friendship or commitment in a romantic relationship. This study shows which topics participants consider to be intimate and how they negotiate the uploading of pictures they deem intimate on their social media profiles.
“Badoo is a social media platform where users look for interaction with strangers, mainly for looking for hook-ups or dates. Despite the fact that some new sexual and romantic relationships may be created through Facebook, it is mainly used to communicate with existing friends and significant others. Including Facebook in the analysis allowed me to observe the differences in photo-sharing practices in two different contexts: the search for sexual and romantic relationships, and the maintenance and development of friendships and existing romances.”
To conduct the study - which involved 24 participants, 14 males and 10 females - Dr Miguel created academic accounts on Badoo and Facebook and presented herself as a researcher in the personal description. Pseudonyms for the participants have been provided.
“I compared the information gathered during the interviews with the information actually disclosed in profiles, which helped me to understand how users negotiate disclosure,” said Dr Miguel. “I was able to identify and compare what kinds of pictures participants disclosed through their profiles and which of those they considered being intimate.
“Luis, a 30-year-old Spain-based participant, described how he found out about the abundance of sexy pictures after creating his Badoo profile. First, he uploaded some pictures and then he checked other users’ profiles. He told me that he felt he did not fit in with the network because his pictures were not sexy. Despite that most participants highlighted the importance of attractive pictures to approach other users in Badoo, while other participants emphasised that they were more interested in personality.
“Luis was a PhD student looking for a girlfriend. During the interview, he complained about the lack of intellectual women on Badoo. He implied that people who only focus on the looks, whose self-representation is mainly constructed around sexy photos, were not interesting for him, as he was a ‘cultivated man’ who wanted to date an ‘elegant and intellectual woman’. Likewise, participant Ana considered that she was not led by the looks to interact with other users but by their communication skills. She said: ‘I don’t pay attention to the pictures with abdominals, I pay attention to the guys who write me something appealing, original, those who read my profile and answer in reference to something I wrote’.”
Dr Miguel added that most participants claimed to not post intimate information on Facebook because they wanted to protect their privacy.