Is social media posting eroding self confidence?

Added: 2026-05-17

[00:00:00]Well, most adults have been living with some form of social media for nearly two decades, but these days it's less about connection and more about curating a carefully crafted image to the world.

[00:00:10]Lisa Robottom is a registered psychologist and joins us this morning.

[00:00:13]So, um some have called this a digital identity crisis, Lisa. Well, can you explain what what's sort of happening with people who are are having trouble in real life because of what they're doing online?

[00:00:24]>> So, I think the the core of it comes back to the fact that in the '50s there was some research done around the whole idea of the midlife crisis.

[00:00:33]And what they suggested is that we sort of have this idealized version of ourselves and then we have the version of ourselves that we actually are. And the gap between our idealized self and who we are, the bigger that gets, the more anxiety and distress we have.

[00:00:49]>> Interesting.

[00:00:50]>> So, the theory is that um for humans it should drive us closer to who our ideal self is. And the idea behind that is that our ideal ideal self should be attainable. Now, the challenge with so social media is that because we have now these images that I mean, we may not even know that they're actually people. They may be AI-generated, you know, they could be photoshops, they could be, you know, in a background that's not really their house, but saying, "Look at me, look what I've got at your age." And so, there's this whole um curating of an image that people then take on either consciously or subconsciously as sort of being, "Well, that's my ideal." But, we're pursuing something that we're never going to get because it doesn't exist.

[00:01:35]And it's also usually such a far cry from what reality is for probably 99% of the population that the gap between this version of our ideal selves and this person we are is so much bigger that the distress that drives underneath and the anxiety and the need to get ahead and move farther and faster is is really going up. Cuz you open up your feed and there's there's likely someone telling you what to wear, what to drive, where to live, all those sorts of things. But the phone is so integrated into our lives right now. Do you have any advice for people who may be struggling with this, always trying to chase what they see on their feeds?

[00:02:14]Um I think probably unfortunately for some people, but fortunately for others, the best thing to do is unplug for a bit. So so where are your neighbors?

[00:02:22]Where are the people in your immediate community at? You know, the people who are similar to you, the people who have the same kinds of opportunities. If you're not um born with a multi-million dollar trust fund, you're not going to be in the [snorts] place that some of these celebrities even depict themselves as being. And so you need to find people who are, you know, kind of starting at your your level in life and who have achieved something achievable in their lifetime. And so you want to be very careful who you're measuring yourself against and keeping in mind that most of what you see on social media is probably a form of fiction. Okay. And what about for those who are, you know, they want to have the perfect post for themselves, portray the family in a perfect light or their job in a perfect light, but then struggle with their day-to-day not meeting what they're posting themselves. What's your advice there? Um I think my advice there would be to really think about like why is it important that you have this perfect image online when the reality of your life is so different because people are going to probably identify more with the reality of your real life than they are to look at that perfectly curated image online and say, "Oh, I wish that was me." Because realistically, you know, any family with like, let's say, three or four toddlers, if you're all perfectly turned out on Facebook, everybody looks at it and goes it no.

[00:03:43]>> [laughter] >> You know, that's not my family.

[00:03:45]>> We know this underneath. And you know, being a little bit more real maybe puts the social back into social media, does it?

[00:03:51]>> Yeah, it It for discussion and communication and identification and all sorts of things that that a kind of a fake um persona just doesn't.

[00:03:59]>> do that. Lisa, we always appreciate your advice. Thanks so much for being here.

[00:04:02]If you'd like to learn more from Lisa or a team at Sojourn Psychology, you can visit sojo.ca.