Science says otherwise.
“People often perceive themselves as more attractive and likable than others [perceive them to be].”
This is the cutting conclusion from a new study that has found you're probably not as great as you think you are, especially if you like to take selfies.
Photo: Unknown
A team of psychologists from the University of Toronto set out to find out if habitual selfie-takers are more likely to develop a self favouring bias: the phenomenon whereby people tend to perceive themselves as better than average on a wide range of traits.
The selfie-study enlisted 198 university students, 100 of which who admitted to regularly taking selfies, and 98 who said they didn't.
The participants were asked to take a selfie using a smartphone and also had their pictures taken by an experimenter. They were then instructed to rate each photo based on how attractive and likable they thought they would come across to others.
The experiementers used a group of independent raters on the internet who were asked to rate the students' photos for attractiveness and likability, as well as for how narcissistic they thought each person was.
Interesting, all the study participants thought more highly of their selfies than the raters did, but the self-proclaimed “selfie-takers" overestimated themselves significantly more.
The researchers concluded that taking regular photos of youself could lend itself to higher levels of the ‘self-favouring’ bias. This is thought to be amplified by selfie takers ability to take flattering photos as well as receiving positive feedback from social media. This gave them an inflated view of their own attractiveness, which increases over time.
The study also concluded that, although people taking selfies may not exhibit any greater narcissism than those who don't, taking photos of yourself probably contributes to people judging you negatively.
Haters gonna hate, etc.
Photo: Unknown
