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Psychology

The edited life

Why their feed is not their life · 13 min

In November 2015, Essena O'Neill, eighteen, with more than half a million followers, deleted about two thousand photos and rewrote the captions on the rest to say what each one had hidden. The photos were real. The life people read from them was not. Then researchers at Stanford found we make the same mistake about people we know, because the hard parts stay private. Why the picture is true but the life you build from it is wrong, and two sentences to say the next time one makes you feel behind.

Takeaways

  • In November two thousand and fifteen, Essena O'Neill, eighteen, with more than half a million followers, deleted about two thousand photos and rewrote the captions on the rest to say what each one had hidden. The photos were real. The life people read from them was not.
  • Researchers at Stanford found that students guessed their fellow students felt bad far less often than they really did, even students they knew well, because people keep bad moments private and share good ones. The mistake is not in the picture. It is in how we read it.
  • Something to try: when a picture makes you feel behind, say two things: "This is true," and "This is not the whole." Then either ask the person one practical question, or decide from your own priorities.

Chapters

  1. The captions0:16
  2. The obvious answer2:17
  3. True, but not the whole4:41
  4. Same picture, different life6:22
  5. Hear it done8:15
  6. Build yours10:11
  7. The answer11:41

References

  1. Time — Teen Instagram star Essena O'Neill quitting social media(2015)
  2. ABC News (Australia) — 'Instafamous' teen Essena O'Neill reveals 'ugly truth' behind social media(2015)
  3. CBS News — Instagram star Essena O'Neill quits "self absorbed" social media(2015)
  4. ABC News (US) — Instagram star says she quit social media to be a positive role model for younger sister(2015)
  5. Today.com — Instagram star quits social media, reveals her 'dream life' was staged(2015)
  6. Newsweek — 'It's not real life': Teen Instagram star quits social media(2015)
  7. Forbes — Instagram star Essena O'Neill quits social media, exposes the business behind her pics(2015)
  8. Global News — Opinions on Essena O'Neill split after some allege social media protest is a hoax(2015)
  9. Time — Instagram star Essena O'Neill breaks her silence on quitting social media(2016)
  10. Pedestrian.tv — Essena O'Neill is back on social media(2019)
  11. Mamamia — Essena O'Neill now: what happened after she quit Instagram(2019)
  12. Jordan, A. H., Monin, B., Dweck, C. S., Lovett, B. J., John, O. P., & Gross, J. J. — Misery has more company than people think: Underestimating the prevalence of others' negative emotions(2011)
  13. Stanford University (Young, S.) — Sharing in sorrow might make us happier, study shows(2010)
  14. Chou, H.-T. G., & Edge, N. — "They are happier and having better lives than I am": The impact of using Facebook on perceptions of others' lives(2012)
  15. Beyens, I., et al. — Social media browsing and adolescent well-being: Challenging the "passive social media use hypothesis"(2021)
  16. Verduyn, P., et al. — Passive Facebook usage undermines affective well-being: Experimental and longitudinal evidence(2015)
  17. Valkenburg, P. M., van Driel, I. I., & Beyens, I. — The associations of active and passive social media use with well-being: A critical scoping review(2022)
  18. McComb, C. A., Vanman, E. J., & Tobin, S. J. — A meta-analysis of the effects of social media exposure to upward comparison targets on self-evaluations and emotions(2023)