The American Academy of Facial and Reconstructive Plastic Surgery says that the majority of clinicians have now seen patients whose desire for plastic surgery is driven by selfies …
The development was reported in a worrying Inverse piece about the selfie generation now wanting to look as good as their filtered photos.
Some are even telling surgeons that they want to look more like their Snapchat butterfly or flower crown photos.
55 percent of clinicians saw patients who “wanted to look better in their selfies” in 2017 — an uptick of 13 percent from the previous year.
That phenomenon has been labelled ‘Snapchat dysmorphia,’ a more specific version of body dysmorphia, where someone over-fixates on perceived flaws in their appearance. It’s characterized by a desire to achieve a look which is unrealistic outside of the fantasy world of photo filters.
“There has been some work suggesting that with social media-induced plastic surgery people come to value, and relate to, the idealized images they create on social media over their actual felt body, and strive to attain ‘ideal’ standards through body modification,” says Kaylee Kruzan, a Ph.D. candidate who works in at Cornell’s Social Media Lab.
Dr. Neelam Vashi, director of the Ethnic Skin Center at Boston Medical Center, says she doesn’t see this problem going away any time soon.
Via TNW. Image: Make-up tutorial to mimic Snapchat filter.
