Why we love taking selfies: Study says they’re better at capturing the meaning of an experience
By Alexandra Mae Jones/CTVNews.ca writer
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Toronto, Ontario (CTV Network) — Those who aren’t fans of the “selfie” have long dismissed the pictures as an exercise in vanity — but according to a new study, taking a selfie may help us better preserve the weight of a moment or event.
The study, published last week in the peer-reviewed journal Social Psychological and Personality Science, found photos that include the photo-taker in them may better allow us to “capture meaning” in a moment, instead of just the physical memory.
Processing our lives through photographs has been a regular part of human life for decades, but the digital age made this phenomenon more present than ever. Millions of photos are shared every day to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms.
Researchers noted that people take photos for a variety of reasons — to remember a specific striking image such as a beautiful landscape, or to capture the feeling of a moment or event with loved ones — and theorized that the type of photo we take may be connected to what we want the photo to mean to us.
A first-person photo is taken from the perspective of the viewer, providing a look through their eyes at a scene. A third-person photo is when the photographer turns the camera and includes themselves in the scene they’re trying to capture.
Although the term “selfie” was coined sometime in the early 2000s, it didn’t start taking off until the early 2010s, as the advent of smartphones meant that an unprecedented number of people were now carrying a device with a camera on it everywhere with them. As front-facing phone cameras, which allowed the photo taker to see themselves on their phone screen before clicking the shutter button, became more widespread and better quality, the selfie spread all over the internet.
But does a selfie achieve a specific goal that first-person photos do not?
Previous research into photo perspectives posted to Instagram found there is usually an even split of first-person and third-person photos shared, with 70 per cent of individuals having at least one recent photo from each of these perspectives.
In order to judge how these two different types of photography create meaning, researchers looked at six recent studies, with more than 2,000 participants in total, all of which investigated how perspective affected the meaning of a photo.
The first study looked at whether the intention going into a photo impacted whether participants would choose to take a selfie or a first-person photo. When given a hypothetical scenario where they might want to take a photo — such as a day at the beach with a friend — participants rated how important it was for them to memorialize the event. Those who said the event had a higher meaning to them were more likely to take a third-person photo than a first-person one.
The second and third studies attempted to manipulate participants’ choice of whether or not to take a first or third-person photo, and found a similar pattern persisted.
In the third study, participants were shown two photos of the same event — one in first-person, one in third-person — and were asked to rate the meaning of the event, as well as whether or not they would’ve chosen to take a first or third-person photo if they were the person in the scenario. When participants were told the goal was to replicate the physical experience of the event, they chose a first-person perspective more often, and were more likely to choose a third-person perspective when told to prioritize meaning.
Studies four and five involved participants rating their own Instagram photos by whether they captured meaning or physical experience best.
The sixth study looked at whether it affected how much a person liked a photo they had taken if their goal — to capture meaning or physical experience — conflicted with the style of photo they had taken based on the pattern established by the study. Participants tended to rate a third-person photo higher if they had intended to capture meaning, compared to if they had intended to capture experience, while first-person photos were rated fairly evenly regardless of the intention.
These six studies all involved recruiting participants online, the majority through the same platform. Participants received a small monetary reward for taking part in the studies.
Researchers noted this study opens up new questions about other ways in which humans understand the world and themselves through the lens of a camera.
“Given the importance that personal photography holds for people’s life narratives, the current work paves the way for future research exploring this connection,” researchers wrote.
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