The use of social media is an increasingly important part of most teenagers’ life, and young people spend a lot of time posting images of themselves or watching advertisements and posts from influencers. How realistic, though, are these images, and what effect can they have on young people’s lives?
In an interesting experiment, the photographer Rankin photographed the faces of a number of teenagers, female and male, aged between 13 and 19. He then asked them to edit his photographs to make themselves ‘social media ready’. The teenagers were shown how to use editing apps such as Facetune, and did all the editing themselves. The Facetune app (there are many others) tells users to ‘make every selfie look amazing’, and its advertising says it can be used to ‘Smooth skin, whiten teeth, swipe away blemishes, contour features, [and] add makeup’.
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