To the delight of duck face advocates everywhere, selfies aren’t going anywhere. Rather than weep for the fate of our appearance-obsessed society, researchers at Gnip and Selfiecity took it upon themselves to analyze this bizarre facet of social media. They searched 120,000 Instagram accounts in New York, Sao Paulo, Berlin, Bangkok and Moscow to produce results that will undoubtedly make historians laugh at us.
Outside that one MAC obsessed friend we all have, selfies don’t make up much of your Instagram feed. Though it differs city by city, selfies only make up 3 to 5% of your Instagram feed. Most selfies are taken by women, though not by that much. Women are 1.3 to 1.9 times more likely to be the subject of a selfie. Not surprisingly, women’s selfies are more expressive. On average, we tilt our heads more than men. The average degree for us is 150% higher than males’.
What does this all mean? Some say it’s given rise to “the female douchebag,” which is exactly what it sounds like: a woman ostentatiously displaying her body with the knowledge that it is more physically fit (or “better” as she sees it) than most of her Instagram followers’ bodies.
Others, say that selfies are empowering to women who don’t fit in the cookie cutter notion of beauty so prevalent in the media. Social media is for normalkins who have a lil’ cellulite or weird birthmarks, and we should embrace our beautifully imperfect selves.
We think there’s room for both types of women (bet you can guess which we prefer). In fact, this diversity is what will keep the selfie popular for some time. Our only question is: will we continue to do selfies when we’re old? Right now, the median age of selfie takers is 23.7. We’re hoping for a generation of nursing home selfie-ers pronto!
Image: http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7417/10846388714_956a695c71_z.jpg
