Running head: LITERATURE REVIEW INSTRUCTIONS
Instructions for Paper I: Study One Literature Review Instructions (Worth 25 Points)
Ryan J. Winter
Florida International University
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PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
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Purpose of Paper I: Study One Literature Review
1). Psychological Purpose
This paper serves several purposes, the first of which is helping you gain insight into
research papers in psychology. As this may be your first time reading and writing papers
in psychology, one goal of Paper I is to give you insight into what goes into such papers.
This study one-lit review will help you a). better understand the psychology topic chosen
for the course this semester (Selfies), b). learn about the various sections of an empirical
research report by reading five peer-reviewed articles (that is, articles that have a Title
Page, Abstract, Literature Review, Methods Section, Results Section, and References
Page), and c). use information gathered from research articles in psychology to help
support your hypotheses for your first study this semester (Selfies). Of course, you’ll be
doing a study two literature review later in the semester, so think of this Paper I as the
first part of your semester long paper. I recommend looking at the example Paper V,
actually, to see what your final paper will look like. It might give you a better idea about
how this current paper (as well as Papers II, III, and IV) all fit together into your final
paper of the semester.
In this current paper (Paper I), you will read five research articles, summarize what the
authors did and what they found, and use those summaries to support your Selfie Study
hypothesis. IMPORTANT: Yes you need five references, but keep in mind that you can
spend a lot of time (a page or two!) summarizing one them and just a sentence or two
summarizing others. Thus spend more time on the more relevant articles!
For this paper, start your paper broadly and then narrow your focus (think about the
hourglass example provided in the lecture). My suggestion is to give a brief overview of
your paper topic in your opening paragraph, hinting at the research variables you plan to
look at for study one. Your next paragraphs will review prior research (those five
references required for this paper). Make sure to draw connections between these papers,
using smooth transitions between paragraphs. Your final paragraphs should use the
research you just summarized to support your research hypothesis. And yes, that means
you MUST include your study predictions (which we provided in the researcher
instructions and debriefing statement. Use them!). In other words, this first paper will
look like the literature reviews for the five research articles you are summarizing for this
assignment. Use those articles as examples! See what they did and mimic their style!
Here, though, you will end the paper after providing your hypothesis. In Paper II, you
will pick the topic up again, but in that future paper you will talk about your own study
methods and results.
2). APA Formatting Purpose
The second purpose of Paper I: Study One Literature Review is to teach you proper
American Psychological Association (APA) formatting. In the instructions below, I tell
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
3
you how to format your paper using APA style. There are a lot of very specific
requirements in APA papers, so pay attention to the instructions below as well as Chapter
14 in your textbook!
3). Writing Purpose
Finally, this paper is intended to help you grow as a writer. Few psychology classes give
you the chance to write papers and receive feedback on your work. This class will! We
will give you extensive feedback on your first few paper in terms of content, spelling,
and grammar. You will even be able to revise aspects of Paper I and include them in
future papers (most notably Papers III and V). My hope is that you craft a paper that
could be submitted to an empirical journal. Thus readers may be familiar with APA style
but not your specific topic. Your job is to educate them on the topic and make sure they
understand how your study design advances the field of psychology.
In fact, your final paper in this class (Paper V), might be read by another professor at
FIU and not your instructor / lab assistant. Write your paper for that reader - the one
who may know NOTHING about your topic and your specific study.
Note: The plagiarism limit for this paper is 30% (though this excludes any overlap your paper
might have with regard to citations, references, and the predictions). Make sure your paper falls
under 30% (or 35% if including predictions).
Note: I am looking for 2.5 pages minimum with predictions.
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
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Instructions for Paper I: Study One Literature Review (Worth 25 Points)
Students: Below are lengthy instructions on how to write your study one literature review. There
is also a checklist document in Canvas, which I recommend you print out and “check off” before
submitting your paper (we are sticklers for APA format, so make sure it is correct! We mark off
if you have a misplaced “&”, so carefully review all of your work and use the checklist! It will
help). Also look at the example paper in Canvas. It will show you what we expect.
1. Title Page: I expect the following format. (5 Points)
a. You must have a header and page numbers on each page.
i. If you don’t know how to insert headers, ask your instructor or watch this
very helpful video! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY.
ii. The header goes at the top of the paper and it is left justified.
1. Use “Insert Headers” or click on the top of the page to open the
header. Make sure to select the “Different first page” option so that
your title page header will differ from subsequent pages
2. The R in Running head is capitalized but the “h” is lower case,
followed by a colon and a short title (in ALL CAPS). This short
running head title can be the same one as the rest of your paper or
it can differ – the choice is yours, but it should be no more than 50
characters including spaces and punctuation
3. Insert a page number as well. The header is flush left, but the page
number is flush right.
iii. Want an example header? Look at the title page of these instructions! You
can use other titles depending on your own preferences (e.g. SOCIAL
MEDIA AND NARCISSISM; SEFLIES VS. GROUPIES; JUDGING
OTHERS; etc.).
b. Your Title should be midway up the page. Again, see my “Title” page above as an
example of the placement, but for your title try to come up with a title that helps
describe your study one. Avoid putting “Paper One”. Rather, consider the titles
you saw in PsycInfo. Create a similar title that lets the reader know what your
paper is about
c. Your name (First Last) and the name of your institution (FIU) beneath the title.
For this class, only your own name will go on this paper. Double space
everything!
i. You can also refer to Chapter 14 in your powerpoints and/or Smith and
Davis textbook
d. This Title Page section will be on page 1
2. Abstract?
a. You DO NOT need an abstract for Paper I: You cannot write it until you run both
study one and two, so omit it for now
3. Literature Review Section (12 points)
a. First page of your literature review (Page 2)
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
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i. Proper header with page numbers. Your running head title will appear in
the header of your page WITHOUT the phrase “Running head”. To insert
this header, use the headers program.
ii. The title of your paper should be on the first line of page two, centered. It
is IDENTICAL to the title on your title page. Just copy and paste it!
iii. The beginning text for your paper follows on the next line
b. Citations for the literature review
i. Your paper must cite a minimum of five (5) empirical research articles
that are based on studies conducted in psychology. That is, each of the
three citations you use should have a literature review, a methods section,
a results section, a conclusion/discussion, and references.
1. For this first paper, you MUST use at least three of the five articles
provided in the blackboard folder. You can use four if you like, but
you must use three at minimum – however, you cannot use all five.
For that fifth article, you must find it using PsycInfo. There are
some other conditions for this fifth article that you must follow:
a. First, remember that the fifth article cannot be any of the
five found in the blackboard folder.
b. Second, for your fifth article, it can be based on a wide
variety of topics, including general priming studies, studies
on narcissism (without a social media angle), studies on
social media (without a narcissism angle), studies on
impression formation, studies on friendships, etc. Trust me,
there are TONS of topics that can help you in your paper.
Just choose one that will help you support your
experimental hypothesis for your Selfie study. That is, it
has to help you justify your study one hypothesis (all
students are using this same hypothesis, so make sure to
read it. You can find it in the researcher instructions along
with the questionnaires you are giving to participants. I
actually suggest copying and pasting that hypothesis into
this first paper at the end).
c. Finally, you can have more than five references if you
want, but you must have a minimum of five references.
ii. Proper citations must be made in the paper – give credit where credit is
due, and don’t make claims that cannot be validated.
iii. If you use a direct quote, make sure to provide a page number for where
you found that quote in the citations. Do not directly quote too often,
though. You can have no more than three direct quotes in the whole
paper (though zero quotes would be even better). Instead, I would like
you to paraphrase when possible.
c. Requirements for the information in your literature review
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
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i. Your study one literature review should use prior research as a starting
point, narrowing down the main theme of your specific project – think
about the hourglass example I gave in class.
ii. The last part of your literature review should narrow down your focus onto
your own study, eventually ending in your study hypothesis. However,
DO NOT go into specific details about your methods. You will talk about
your specific methods in Paper II in a few weeks.
iii. Again, to make it clear, at the end of your paper you will give an overview
of your research question, providing your specific predictions/hypotheses.
d. The literature review must have minimum of two (2) full pages NOT
INCLUDING THE HYPOTHESES. It has a maximum of five (5) pages (thus,
with the title page and references page, the paper should be between 4.5 and 7
pages). If it is only four and a half pages (again, including the hypotheses), it
better be really, really good. I don’t think I could do this paper justice in fewer
than five pages, so if yours isn’t at least five pages, I doubt it will get a good
grade.
4. References (6 points)
a. The References section starts on its own page, with the word References centered.
Use proper APA format in this section or you will lose points.
b. All five references that you cited in the literature review must be in this section
(there should be more than five references here if you cited more than five
articles, which is fine in this paper). However, at least three must come from the
article folder on blackboard while the remaining two can come from either the last
blackboard paper or two new ones from psychinfo. Only peer-reviewed articles
are allowed here (no books, journals, websites, or other secondary resources are
allowed for paper one).
c. For references, make sure you:
i. use alphabetical ordering (start with the last name of the first author)
ii. use the authors’ last names but only the initials of their first/middle name
iii. give the date in parentheses – e.g. (2007).
iv. italicize the name of the journal article
v. give the volume number, also in italics
vi. give the page numbers (not italicized) for articles
vii. provide the doi (digital object identifier) if present (not italicized)
5. Writing Quality (2 Points)
a. This includes proper grammar and spelling. I recommend getting feedback on
your paper from the Pearson Writer program prior uploading it on Canvas.
6. Between the title page, literature review, and reference page, I expect a minimum of 4
pages and a maximum of 7 pages for this assignment. But like I said, the shorter the
paper, the less likely it is to get a good grade, so aim for 5 pages minimum.
The above information is required for your paper, but I wanted to provide a few tips about
writing your literature review as well. Students often struggle with the first paper, but hopefully
this will give you some good directions:
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
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•
First, remember that you need 5 references, all of which MUST be peer-reviewed (three
coming from the blackboard folder and one or two that you find on your own using
PsycInfo).
•
Second, I don't expect a lengthy discussion for each and every article that you cite. You
might spend a page talking about Article A and a sentence or two on Article B. The
amount of time you spend describing an article you read should be proportional to how
important it is in helping you defend your hypotheses. See if there is a prior study that
looks a lot like yours (hint – there is at least one, which I based this study on, but you’ll
have to find it on your own!). I would expect you to spend more time discussing that
prior research since it is hugely relevant to your own study. If an article you read simply
supports a global idea that ties into your study but has very different methods (like
"frustrated people get mad!"), you can easily mention it in a sentence or two without
delving into a lot of detail. Tell a good story in your literature review, but only go into
detail about plot elements that have a direct bearing on your study!
•
Third, this paper is all about supporting your hypotheses. Know what your hypotheses are
before you write the paper, as it will help you determine how much time to spend on each
article you are citing. My suggestion is to spend some time describing the nature of
selfies and narcissism, and then talking about studies that looked at this area. Use those
studies to help defend your own study hypothesis. That is, “Since they found X in this
prior study, that helps support the hypothesis in the present study”. Do you remember
your two hypotheses? Okay, I’ll be really helpful here. BELOW are your hypotheses. In
your paper, support it! Just remember that the rest of your paper needs to be at least two
full pages NOT INCLUDING the hypothesis below. In other words, including the
hypotheses below, your actual text for your paper should be at least two and a half pages!
o We predict that if participants are exposed to selfie photos, then they will believe
that an Instagram user 1). updates her profile picture more frequently, 2). posts to
her social media accounts more often, and 3). seems more self-absorbed, selfish,
narcissistic, and egotistical, compared to participants exposed to either groupie or
professional photos, though these latter two conditions should not differ from
each other in their Instagram user ratings.
•
Fourth, make sure to proofread, proofread, proofread! Use the Pearson Writer for help,
but note that their suggestions are just that – suggestions. It is up to you to make sure the
flow of the paper is easy to understand. Good luck!
•
Finally, go look at the supporting documents for this paper. There is a checklist, a grade
rubric, and an example paper. All will give you more information about what we are
specifically looking for as well as a visual example of how to put it all together. Good
luck!
Running head: COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING
Counterfactual Thinking: Appointing Blame
Former Student
Florida International University
1
COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING
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Counterfactual Thinking: Appointing Blame
As free-willed beings, we can often become the victims of our own decisions. Imagine
accidentally running over a stray cat because you decided to look away from the road at the exact
moment the kitten decided to cross the street. Following the accident, most people would be
plagued with thoughts of how alternative circumstances or decisions could have prevented such
an unfortunate situation. Every time an individual forms a ‘what if’ scenario in which he or she
mentally alters the course of events occurred, they are participating in a process that is known as
counterfactual thinking (Ruiselová, Prokopčáková, & Kresánek, 2007; Williams, Lees-Haley, &
Price 1996). This process allows individuals to consider the multiple factors at play in a situation
(i.e mutability), and to decide what specific condition was responsible for the ultimate outcome
of the event. The primary focus of our study is to analyze the extent of culpability people place
on a particular factor depending on the preventability of the outcome. That is, if it is easy to
“undue” an event that ends in a tragic outcome, will participants find an actor who fails to
engage in that easy behavior more at fault?
The development of counterfactual thoughts relies on the variability of the situation, as
well as the knowledge that different actions could have resulted in alternate outcomes (Alquist,
Ainsworth, Baumeister, Daly, & Stillman, 2015). According to Alquist et al., situations that are
believed to be highly changeable generate more counterfactual thoughts than events that seem
unavoidable. However, ruminating on every conceivable alternative of a situation would take an
unlimited amount of time and resources. Instead of allotting so much time and energy on a
cognitive task, people tend to narrow down the different scenarios that come to mind according
to the degree of controllability of the factors involved (McCloy & Byrne, 2000). For example,
the deliberate decisions individuals make that ultimately lead to a certain outcome is considered
COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING
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to be a controllable event, whereas uncontrollable events are unavoidable circumstances, such as
traffic jams or natural disasters (McCloy & Byrne, 2000). When mentally forming a scenario
different than the one occurred, individuals tend to change controllable rather than uncontrollable
events (2000). Therefore, events that are within an individual’s jurisdiction generally receive the
brunt of the blame for the resulting situation.
In a similar light, a study performed by McCloy and Byrne (2000), discovered that
inappropriate events are more often changed through the process of counterfactual thinking than
appropriate ones, especially when the outcome of these events was negative. Inappropriate
events include the decisions individuals make that are considered to be ‘socially wrong’, whereas
appropriate events are ‘socially acceptable’ actions. Due to these results, we can conclude that
what McCloy and Byrne consider to be “inappropriate controllable” events, will likely be
regarded as highly culpable factors in the outcome of a situation.
Another contributing factor to perceived culpability is the extent of knowledge of the
actors involved in an event, as well as the intent of their actions (Gilbert, Tenney, Holland, &
Spellman, 2015). For example, in the aforementioned scenario, had the driver known that
looking away from the road would have caused her to run over the stray cat, the driver would
have been more likely to be perceived guilty, even though the actions and the outcome of the
situation remained the same. This rationalization is the product of a bottom-up method of
thinking in which individuals are able to generate more counterfactual thoughts due to the actor’s
knowledge of the outcome (Gilbert et al., 2015). As these authors have noted, the increased
development of counterfactual thoughts will in turn attribute more responsibility to the actor,
which will ultimately increase perceived blame. But this is not the full picture when it comes to
focusing on the role of counterfactual thoughts in altering participant responses.
COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING
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In pursuance of counterfactual thinking and its relationship to perceived blame, we have
devised a study that analyzed the extent of culpability people place on a particular factor
depending on the preventability of the outcome. We provided participants with one of three
scenarios, each of which depicted a variation of the same situation where alternate events lead to
different conclusions. In the changeable condition, an actor engaged in a behavior that led to an
undesirable outcome (death) that could have been avoided had he acted differently. In the
unchangeable condition, the same actor engaged in a behavior that once again led to an
undesirable outcome, but here the outcome could not have been avoided if he acted differently.
In the neutral condition, the actor engaged in an alternative behavior, but the outcome was still
undesirable. We predicted that participants would place more blame on the actor in the
changeable condition where the actor could have avoided the undesirable outcome had he
behaved differently than in both the unchangeable and neutral conditions, where the actor’s
behavior could not be altered. This is because we expected changeable participants to generate
more counterfactuals (more statements about how the actor could have behaved) in the
changeable condition.
COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING
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References
Alquist, J. L., Ainsworth, S. E., Baumeister, R. F., Daly, M., & Stillman, T. F. (2015). The
making of might-have-beens: Effects of free will belief on counterfactual thinking.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 41(2), 268-283. doi:
10.1177/0146167214563673
Gilbert, E. A., Tenney, E. R., Holland, C. R., & Spellman, B. A. (2015). Counterfactuals,
control, and causation: Why knowledgeable people get blamed more. Personality and
Social Psychology Bulletin, 41(5), 643-658. doi: 10.1177/0146167215572137
McCloy, R., & Byrne, R. M. J. (2000). Counterfactual thinking about controllable
events. Memory & Cognition, 28(6), 1071-1078. doi: 10.3758/BF03209355
Ruiselová, Z., Prokopčáková, A., & Kresánek, J. (2007). Counterfactual thinking in relation to
the personality of women--doctors and nurses. Studia Psychologica, 49(4), 333-339.
Williams, C. W., Lees-Haley, P., & Price, J. R. (1996). The role of counterfactual thinking and
causal attribution in accident-related judgments. Journal of Applied Social Psychology,
26(23), 2076-2099. doi: 10.1111/j.1559-1816.1996.tb01789
Checklist – Paper One: Study One Literature Review
Use the check sheet below to make sure your paper is the best it can be! Make sure you answer
“Yes” to all questions before submitting your paper or you will lose points!
General Paper Format
Yes
No
1. Is everything in your paper (including headers, the main body of your study
one literature review, and references) in 12 point Times New Roman font?
2. Is everything in your paper double spaced, including references (here I mean
the spacing above and below each line, not the spaces following a period)?
3. Do you have one inch margins on all sides of the paper (one inch from the top
of the page, one inch from the bottom, and one inch from each side)
4. Are the first lines of all paragraphs indented roughly ½ inch?
5. Are your paragraphs aligned left? (That is, text should be flush left, with lines
lining up on the left of the page, but text should NOT line up on the right side
of the page – it should look ragged)
6. Do you need help figuring out how to configure a word document in APA
format (inserting headers, page numbers, proper indents, etc.)? If YES or NO,
I highly recommend watching this video which walks you through setting up
an APA formatted paper! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY
Yes
No
Yes
No
Title page
Header
1. Do you have the phrase “Running head” in your header (with a lower case h)?
2. Is the rest of your Running head title in ALL CAPS?
3. Is your Running head in 12 point Times New Roman font?
4. Do you have a page number that is flush right (also in 12 point Times New
Roman font)?
5. Is your header 50 characters or less (including spaces and punctuation)?
Title / Name / Institution
1. Is your title 12 words or less (as recommended by the APA)?
2. Does your title describe your general paper theme (while avoiding something
blank like “Paper One: Literature Review”)? Note that your header and title
can differ!
3. Do all title words with three letters or more start with a capital letter?
4. Are your name and institution correct?
5. Are your title, name, and institution elements centered and in 12 point Times
New Roman font?
Literature Review
Header
1. Is your header title present and identical to your header from the title page?
2. Is your header title in ALL CAPS and 12 point Times New Roman font?
3. Does your header on this second page omit the phrase “Running head”
4. Do you have a page number starting on page 2
Title for the literature review
1. Do you have the identical title you used on the title page rewritten at the top
Yes
No
Yes
No
of your literature review?
2. Is this title centered?
Main body of the literature review
1. Does your literature review start broadly, giving a brief overview of the paper
to come?
2. Does your literature review start to narrow down toward your hypotheses?
3. Do your paragraphs transition from one to the next? (That is, avoid simply
listing studies you read. Tie them together. How does Study A in paragraph A
relate to Study B in paragraph B?)
4. Does your paper end in your very specific hypotheses? (You will lose a lot of
points if your paper doesn’t provide the specific predictions!)
5. Did you make sure your predictions are written in the past tense?
6. Is your paper at least two pages long (not including the hypotheses)?
Citations for the literature review
1. Did you cite a minimum of 5 citations? (Note that you can give a lot of detail
for some articles you cite but only a sentence or two for others. How much
detail you go into depends on how important the article is in helping your
support your hypotheses)
2. Are your citations in APA format (That is, ONLY the last name of the
author(s) and date of publication)?
a. Note that you do NOT include first names, initials, or the title of the article
the authors wrote when citing. That information belongs in the references
pages only.
b. Also note that you only use an ampersand – the & symbol – when it occurs
within parentheses. In other instances, use the word “and”
3. If you quoted, did you provide a page number for the direct quote?
4. If you paraphrased in any way, did you cite the source of that information?
5. Did you cite everything that sounded like it was factual information?
6. Did you make sure the period follows the citation rather than coming before it?
References Page
Title for the references page
1. Do references start on their own page?
2. Is the word “References” centered?
References – Make sure these are in APA format!
1. Are references listed in alphabetical order (starting with the last name of the
first author listed)?
2. Are all citations from the literature review referenced?
3. Is the first line of the reference flush left while subsequent lines are indented
(Note: Use the ruler function for this. DO NOT simply tab)?
4. Did you use the “&” symbol when listing more than one author name?
5. Did you include the date of publication
6. For article references, is the article title (which is not italicized) present, with
only the first word and proper names starting with a capital letter?
7. For article references, is the name of the journal present with all major words
starting with a capital letter (Note: this journal title is italicized)?
8. For article references, is the volume number italicized
9. For article references, are the page numbers present (not italicized)
10. For article references, is the DOI present
Yes
No
Writing Quality
1. Did you proofread your paper, go to the writing center, go to the research
methods help center, or use the Pearson writer to make sure your paper flows
well?
2. Did you use the past tense (which is recommended, since your papers in this
class will reflect work you already did rather than work you will do)?
3. Did you use a scientific / objective terms like “people”, “participants”. “users”,
“readers”, etc. (as opposed to subjective words like “you”, “we”, “me”, “I”, or
“us”, etc.)?
Paper I: Study One Literature Review - Grading Rubric (25 points)
1). Title Page (5 points – 1 page)
Items of relevance:
Proper APA formatted Running head in header with page numbers
Student name and Institution
2). Abstract / Graphs / Tables (Not Required – No Points)
3). Literature Review (12 points – 2 to 5 pages not including the hypotheses)
Items of relevance:
a). Psychological Purpose: Your paper will meet the psychological objectives for
this section, including:
1). narrowing your paper from general information toward the beginning to
specific information towards the end (tells a story)
2). presenting the information clearly, educating your reader about the area
of research (keep in mind that this area may be new to them as well.
Assume they need you to teach them the material). You should have
smooth transitions between paragraphs.
3). ending your paper with your specific hypotheses / predictions
b). APA Formatting Purpose: Your paper will meet the formatting objectives for
this section, including:
1). proper APA formatting for title, header, and page numbers
2). You should have five citations (minimum) that match up with the
references in your reference section. Citations are in proper APA format
4) Reference Section (6 points)
Items of relevance:
Five references minimum (same as those cited) in proper APA format. Three
references MUST come from blackboard; a fourth MUST come from your
own research the fifth can come from either blackboard or from research you
do on your own
5). Writing Quality (2 points)
a). Writing Purpose: Your paper will meet the writing objectives for this section,
including:
1). Proper grammar and spelling, good flow to the paper, good transition
sentences between paragraphs
Note: Use the Paper Checklist, too! It is much more detailed then this grading rubric!
Computers in Human Behavior 66 (2017) 370e376
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Computers in Human Behavior
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/comphumbeh
Full length article
Virtual makeover: Selfie-taking and social media use increase
selfie-editing frequency through social comparison
Jiyoung Chae
Department of Communications and New Media, National University of Singapore, Blk AS6, #03-09, 11 Computing Drive, Singapore, 117416, Singapore
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history:
Received 27 June 2016
Received in revised form
21 September 2016
Accepted 5 October 2016
Available online 17 October 2016
Studies have explored the predictors of selfie-posting, but rarely investigated selfie-editing, a virtual
makeover for online self-presentation. This study, based on social comparison theory, examined a psychological pathway from individual characteristics to selfie-editing behavior through social comparison.
It was hypothesized that selfie-taking, public self-consciousness, social media use, and satisfaction with
facial appearance would indirectly influence selfie-editing through social comparison of appearance
(with friends or social media influencers/celebrities). A two-wave longitudinal online survey was conducted in South Korea among female smartphone users aged 20 to 39 (N ¼ 1064 at Wave 1 and 782 at
Wave 2). The results revealed that frequent selfie-taking, higher levels of public self-consciousness, and
more use of social media at Wave 1 were associated with social comparison with friends at Wave 1,
which increased selfie-editing behavior at Wave 2. However, those three independent variables did not
have indirect effects on selfie-editing at Wave 2 through social comparison with influencers/celebrities.
Also, satisfaction with facial appearance had neither direct nor indirect effect on selfie-editing at Wave 2.
The findings suggest that individuals engage in social comparison and resulting selfie-editing not
because of their dissatisfaction with appearance, but because of the desire for more ideal online selfpresentation.
© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Selfie-editing
Social media
Public self-consciousness
Social comparison
Satisfaction with facial appearance
1. Introduction
Selfies have become a popular cultural phenomenon across the
world. Selfie refers to a self-portrait that a person takes using a
smartphone or webcam (Oxford Dictionaries, 2013). Recent years
have witnessed a dramatic increase of selfie-taking and posting
behaviors. On Instagram, an image-based social media platform,
more than 288 million photos are hashtagged with #me and 255
million with #selfie (Websta, 2016). With the popularity of selfies,
studies have investigated the relationship between personality and
selfie-posting behavior. For example, those with higher level of
narcissism are more likely to post their selfies (Kim, Lee, Sung, &
Choi, 2016; Weiser, 2015). Narcissism and selfie-taking are mutually influencing each other over time, meaning that narcissism increases selfie-taking and selfie-taking increases the level of
narcissism (Halpern, Valenzuela, & Katz, 2016). In addition, selfieposting frequency is higher among individuals with exhibitionism
and extraversion (Sorokowska et al., 2016).
However, studies to date have rarely examined the behavior that
E-mail address: cnmcj@nus.edu.sg.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2016.10.007
0747-5632/© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
often comes before posting: Selfie-editing. Selfie-editing in this
paper refers to digital enhancement of selfies using computer
programs or smartphone applications (e.g., using filters, enlarging
eyes, removing blemishes or slimming faces). Easier than actual
plastic surgery, it is a kind of virtual makeover for better online
presentation of self. A survey among 1710 adults in the U.S. revealed
that 50% of respondents edit their selfies (Renfrew Center
Foundation, 2014). Studies have reported narcissism and selfobjectification as predictors of selfie-editing (Fox & Rooney,
2015). Selfie-editing is also related to concerns over diet (McLean,
Paxton, Wertheim, & Masters, 2015). However, no previous study
has theoretically and systematically examined the psychological
mechanism leading to selfie-editing.
The current study investigates this issue by applying social
comparison theory (Festinger, 1954). The theory postulates that
human beings have a basic instinct to compare ourselves with
others to evaluate our own abilities and opinions. Selfie-editing
entails social comparison because it is based on self-evaluation of
appearance. Selfie-editing might be due to the dissatisfaction about
one's appearance in selfies or due to the desire to look better than
others; either is a result of self-evaluation. Then there must be
individual characteristics that prompt social comparison behavior.
J. Chae / Computers in Human Behavior 66 (2017) 370e376
In summary, the goal of the current study is to examine the process
through which individual characteristics indirectly increase selfieediting behavior through social comparison.
This study aims to fill the gap in existing literature in three ways.
First, rather than simply identifying predictors of selfie-editing, this
study will suggest a psychological pathway leading to editing
behavior. Second, this study will be an extension of social comparison theory by demonstrating how the use of new media technologydselfies and social mediadis related to social comparison
behavior and what the outcomes of such comparison are. Third, by
using two-wave longitudinal data, this study will provide stronger
evidence about the relationship between individual characteristics,
social comparison, and selfie-editing.
2. Predicting selfie-editing behavior
Human beings try to manage the impression that others have of
them by packaging or changing their appearance or behavior,
which is called self-presentation (Goffman, 1959). According to
Walther (1992), computer-mediated communication has made selective self-presentation possible because messages can be edited
and individuals have more time for better presentation of the self.
Compared to face-to-face communication, individuals can more
carefully calculate and organize their self-presentation (Walther,
1992). Based on Walther's proposition, Hancock and Toma (2009)
extended the scope of selective self-presentation to photographs
because photos can be selected and digitally altered for selfpresentation in a computer-mediated environment. Thus, selfies
are an effective way to construct ideal self-image (Halpern, Katz, &
Carril, 2017), and selfie-editing is a means for selective selfpresentation. Chua and Chang (2016) conducted in-depth interviews of Singaporean teenage girls and found that girls edit their
selfies to get favorable attention from peers by meeting the standard of beauty defined by peer norms. Specifically, girls wanted
quantitative evidence of popularity such as likes, followers, or
comments. To construct a self-image that others like, one must
evaluate their appearance.
To evaluate, improve, or enhance oneself, individuals engage in
social comparison (Buunk & Gibbons, 2007; Festinger, 1954). Thus,
selfie-editing is likely to be the result of social comparison of
appearance. Social comparison can be either upward or downward
(for details, see Corcoran, Crusius, & Musweiler, 2011). When upward comparison happens, individuals want to improve themselves; upward comparison will lead to selfie-editing to
compensate for one's weaknesses. If downward comparison arises
and individuals feel satisfied with their appearance, they might be
less interested in selfie-editing. However, when it comes to
appearanceda premium in the online world as well as real
worlddpeople satisfied with themselves want to look even better if
possible; celebrities still edit their selfies online to keep their superiority and continue to draw attention. The effect of downward
comparison may be smaller than upward comparison, but their
relationship with selfie-editing will be similar.
Rather than the direction of comparison, this study considers
the target of social comparison. Selfies are shared online, and
friends on social media must be frequent targets of comparison.
Peer comparison is prevalent on social media among young people
and both downward and upward comparison can happen (Chua &
Chang, 2016). However, although social comparison usually happens between similar individuals, people engage in social comparison with dissimilar others as well (Gilbert, Giesler, & Morris,
1995). For example, females compare their bodies to thin models
in the media and feel dissatisfaction (Grabe, Ward, & Hyde, 2008).
Thus, social media influencers or celebrities can be the target of
comparison. Social media influencers are ordinary Internet users
371
who exhibit their personal lives online to a large number of followers, and make profits by such exhibition of their lives (Abidin,
2016). Although they are not celebrities, their popularity is called
micro-celebrity, a newly emerged celebrity based on one's performance using new media technologies (Senft, 2008). Influencers'
works are mainly dependent on their selfies (Abidin, 2016). Celebrities also post their selfies on social media platforms. Comparison with influencers or celebrities' is likely to be upward, but it is
not clear whether such comparison leads to selfie-editing. Based on
comparison with friends, individuals will edit their selfies in the
desire to present the better self to others, but the comparison with
influencers/celebrities might not be related to such desire because
they are not the audience of ordinary people's online selfpresentation.
Therefore, the following hypothesis and research question were
advanced. In testing them, this study used two-wave longitudinal
data and controlled for selfie-editing at W1. It was to see whether
social comparison at Wave 1 (W1) increases selfie-editing at W2
over and above the effect of selfie-editing at W1 (Campbell & Kwak,
2011; Eveland & Thomson, 2006). Thus, when selfie-editing frequency at W1 is controlled for:
H1. Social comparison with friends at Wave 1 will increase selfieediting frequency at Wave 2.
R1. Will social comparison with influencers/celebrities increase
selfie-editing frequency at Wave 2?
3. Predicting social comparison behavior
Then the question becomes who engages in such social comparison of appearance. Engagement in the social comparison process is relatively automatic (Gilbert et al., 1995), but individual
differences exist. Buunk and Gibbons (2007) reviewed previous
studies and presented three features of individuals with high social
comparison orientation: “(a) a high accessibility and awareness of
the self, (b) an interest in what others feel and think, and (c) some
degree of negative affectivity and self-uncertainty” (p. 14). Based on
this categorization, this study theorizes the relationship between
individual characteristics and social comparison.
3.1. High accessibility and awareness of the self
First, frequent selfie-takers are more likely to compare their
appearance to that of others. Selfies provide more opportunity to
take a closer look into one's appearance (i.e., high accessibility). A
survey among plastic surgeons reported an increase of patients
becoming more self-aware of their facial appearance due to their
selfies (American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive
Surgery, 2014). Greater exposure to their own image might lead
to more frequent social comparison. Moreover, the relationship
between selfie-taking and social comparison also can be explained
by narcissism. As stated earlier, several studies (Halpern et al., 2016;
Kim et al., 2016) have confirmed the positive relationship between
narcissism and selfie-taking. That is, frequent selfie-takers are
likely to be narcissists who believe that they are unique and superior to others and need attention and admiration from others
(American Psychiatric Association, 2000). Narcissists might want to
confirm their superiority by comparing themselves to others.
Second, similarly, individuals who are inherently conscious
about themselves (i.e., high awareness of the self) will engage in
social comparison. Both public self-consciousness and private selfconsciousness are strong predictors of social comparison (Buunk &
Gibbons, 2007), and this study adopts public self-consciousness.
Public self-consciousness refers to “an awareness of the self as a
372
J. Chae / Computers in Human Behavior 66 (2017) 370e376
social object” (Fenigstein, 1979, p. 76). Those with high public selfconsciousness put much importance on how they look and thus it is
positively associated with body dissatisfaction (Chae, 2014). Highly
self-conscious people will worry about how others perceive their
appearance and to evaluate their appearance they will compare
themselves to others. Based on these rationales, H2 and H3 were
advanced. In both cases, people will compare themselves not only
with friends but also with influencers/celebrities (Grabe et al.,
2008). Social comparison is almost spontaneous and automatic
(Gilbert et al., 1995), and thus these relationships were tested with
the same wave data (W1).
H2. The frequency of selfie-taking at Wave 1 will be positively
associated with social comparison behavior (with friends, with influencers/celebrities) at Wave 1.
H3. Public self-consciousness at Wave 1 will be positively associated
with social comparison behavior (with friends, with influencers/celebrities) at Wave 1.
3.2. Interest in what others feel and think
Third, use of social media might be positively related to social
comparison of appearance. More use of social media means greater
exposure to others' selfies, which provides more comparisonrelated information. More theoretically, Buunk and Gibbons
(2007) stated that interpersonal orientation is related to high
levels of social comparison orientation. In other words, those who
are interested in others, care about others' opinion, like mutual selfdisclosure have a high level of social comparison orientation. Use of
social media can reflect such interpersonal orientation since it
means a greater need for social interaction. People use social media
to “connect, communicate, and interact with each other and their
mutual friends” (Correa, Hinsley, & De Zuniga, 2010, p. 248). Previous studies have reported a positive association between extraversion and social media use (Correa, Hinsley, & Zuniga, 2010; Ong
et al., 2011; Ryan & Xenos, 2011). Extraverts use social media to
make and maintain connections and to show what they are
currently doing (Bibby, 2008), which can translate as interpersonal
orientation.
Frequent social media users are not only extraverts but also
narcissists (Halpern et al., 2016). Narcissism is associated with social comparison orientation (Buunk & Gibbons, 2007). Halpern
et al. (2016) provided three reasons why narcissists like social
media. They seek weak-tie relationships rather than emotionally
attached ones, they can boast of their popularity through social
media, and they can strategically present themselves by texts and
photos (Halpern et al., 2016). Therefore, narcissistic individuals,
who are frequent social media users, engage in social comparison to
see whether they look better than others. Whether it is based on
extraversion or narcissism, use of social media predicts social
comparison of appearance.
H4. The use of social media at Wave 1 will be positively associated
with social comparison behavior (with friends, with influencers/celebrities) at Wave 1.
3.3. Negative affectivity and self-uncertainty
Fourth, level of satisfaction with facial appearance might be
inversely related to social comparison of appearance. Low satisfaction with facial appearance must be linked to low self-esteem.
Although narcissism, represented by high self-esteem, is a predictor of social comparison, negative affectivity and self-uncertainty
such as low self-esteem and neuroticism also influence social
comparison (Buunk & Gibbons, 2007). Buunk and Gibbons (2007)
suggested that the discrepancy might be because comparisonoriented people have various aspects that changes based on
circumstance. Consistent with this view, Mehdizadeh (2010) reported that both high narcissism and low self-esteem are related to
more use of Facebook and more self-promotional content generation. Add to this, it is also possible that the direction of social
comparison might be different to narcissists and people with low
self-esteem. As mentioned, narcissistic people would engage in
downward social comparison to maintain their inflated selfconcept while people with low self-esteem would engage in upward social comparison to evaluate themselves and find a way for
self-enhancement. H5 was advanced.
H5. Satisfaction with facial appearance at Wave 1 will be negatively
associated with social comparison behavior (with friends, with influencers/celebrities) at Wave 1.
Connecting previous hypotheses, the current study suggests
social comparison as a mechanism through which individual
characteristics lead to selfie-editing. Those who take more selfies,
more frequently use social media, have higher public selfconsciousness, and have less satisfaction with facial appearance
will engage in social comparison with friends or influencers/celebrities. Social comparison with friends will lead to selfie-editing
as hypothesized in H1, but this study did not hypothesized the
relationship between comparison with influencers/celebrities and
selfie-editing (R1). Thus, the following four mediation hypotheses
and four research questions were advanced. When selfie-editing at
Wave 1 is controlled for:
H6eH9. Selfie-taking frequency (H6), Public self-consciousness (H7),
Social media use (H8) and, satisfaction with facial appearance (H9) at
Wave 1 will indirectly influence selfie-editing at Wave 2 through social
comparison with friends at Wave 1.
R2-R5. Will selfie-taking frequency (R2), public self-consciousness
(R3), social media use (R4), and satisfaction with facial appearance
(R5) at Wave 1 indirectly influence selfie-editing at Wave 2 through
social comparison with influencers/celebrities?
4. Method
4.1. Participants and procedures
An online survey was conducted by a Korean research company
among Korean female smartphone users aged 20 to 39. Smartphone ownership in Korea is 88% as of 2015 according to Pew
Research Center (Poushter, 2016) and selfies are mainly taken by
smartphones. This study included only women because, generally
women are more likely to feel pressure than men to meet the unrealistic social standards of beauty (Bordo, 1993; Wolf, 1990). Previous studies mainly explored selfie-editing in adolescent girls (e.g.,
Chua & Chang, 2016; McLean et al., 2015), and this study focused on
women in their 20s and 30s. Among the company's registered
online panels (a total of 1,148,766 as of March 2016), females between 20 and 39 were 453,298. The company randomly emailed
7625 panel members; 7424 females actually received the email
(due to failure of delivery) and 2355 checked the email. Those who
agreed to participate were directed to the online questionnaire.
Finally 1064 females completed the questionnaire at W1 in March
2016. The second survey was performed one month after the first
one among those completed the first one. Based on the recommendation of Callegaro and DiSogra (2008), completion rate and
attrition rate for opt-in online panels were calculated. Completion
rate was 14% and attrition rate was 27%. Although the completion
J. Chae / Computers in Human Behavior 66 (2017) 370e376
rate was somewhat low, 10e25% completion rate is often the case
with detailed web surveys in contrast to short phone surveys
(Sauermann & Roach, 2013).
Participants were on average 29.3 years old. Of the participants,
66.4% of them were employed (including part-time and selfemployed people) and 14.9% were college students. Most were
not married (69.6%). They received 14.86 years of formal education
and their household income was KRW 4,313,000 per month, which
corresponds to USD 3655 per month (USD 43,860 per year).
Compared to the most recent national statistics (Statistics Korea,
2016), the sample was, despite its non-probability nature, not
largely deviant from the general public in those age groups.
Employment rates of women in their 20s and 30s is 59.6%. A
woman's average age at first marriage in Korea is 30.0, which explains why most women in the sample are single. Average monthly
household income is KRW 4,555,219, similar to that of the current
sample. For descriptive statistics, see Table 1.
4.2. Measures
4.2.1. Selfie-taking frequency (independent variable 1)
Participants reported how many times, in the past 30 days, they
had taken their own selfies based on a six-point scale (1 ¼ never to
6 ¼ more than twice a day). Then the responses were transformed to
represent actual frequency of selfie-taking per week. For example, 1
(¼ never) was recoded as 0 and 5 (¼ once a day) as 7.
4.2.2. Public self-consciousness (IV2)
A scale by Fenigstein, Scheier, and Buss (1975) was used. The
scale assesses the level of an individual's consciousness toward
other people's perception on oneself. Items include “I'm selfconscious about the way I look” and “I usually worry about making a good impression” (1 ¼ strongly disagree to 5 ¼ strongly agree;
a ¼ 0.83 at W1 and a ¼ 0.83 at W2).
4.2.3. Social media use (IV3)
Social media use was measured by asking how often they use
each of eight social media platforms on average weekdays: blog,
online communities, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Band,
and Kakao story (1 ¼ never to 7 ¼ more than 10 times a day).
Band and Kakao story are social media platforms especially
popular in Korea. Like selfie-taking frequency, social media use was
also transformed as a frequency per day; 3 (¼ once a day) was
recoded as 1 and 7 (¼ more than 10 times a day) as 10. Then all items
were averaged.
373
4.2.4. Satisfaction with facial appearance (IV4)
The level of satisfaction with facial features was measured by
10-item scale (Pusic, Klassen, Scott, & Cano, 2013). The scale assesses overall satisfaction with one's facial appearance with items
like “How symmetric your face looks?” and “How balanced your
face looks?” Among original ten items, one item that Pusic et al.
(2013) reported having a problem in fit residuals was deleted and
nine items were used (1 ¼ very dissatisfied to 4 ¼ very satisfied;
a ¼ 0.87 at W1 and a ¼ 0.87 at W2).
4.2.5. Social comparison behavior (mediator)
Participants reported how often, in the past 30 days, they
compared their appearance with friends, social media influencers,
and celebrities (1 ¼ never to 5 ¼ always). The correlation between
comparison with influencer and celebrities was too high (r ¼ 0.81,
p < 0.001) and the two items were averaged.
4.2.6. Photo-editing frequency (dependent variable)
Photo-editing frequency was measured by asking how often
they edit/retouch their selfies by using photo-editing apps or
computer programs in the past 30 days (1 ¼ never to 5 ¼ always).
4.2.7. Control variables
As selfie editing requires the use of technology, socio-economic
variablesdmonthly income (1 ¼ KRW 0 e 2,990,000 to 6 ¼ more
than KRW 7,000,000), education (1 ¼ elementary school to
6 ¼ postgraduates)dand age were included. In addition, marital
status (1 ¼ being a single, 0 ¼ else) was adopted because single
females might be more interested in appearance and want to present better images. General media use was used because it should
be associated with social media use. It was measured by averaging
three items asking the amount of time spent on reading print
media, watching television, and using the Internet on an average
week day (0 ¼ never to 5 ¼ more than two hours). Income, education, and general media use were recoded to represent actual
amount of money, years of education, and the amount of time,
respectively. For example, those who responded with “5 (¼ college
graduate)” to education question were recoded as 16 (years of education). For means and standard deviations of all variables, see
Table 1.
5. Results
As a preliminary analysis, bivariate correlations between primary variables were calculated. Except satisfaction with facial
appearance, the other three IVs at W1 were all positively correlated
Table 1
Descriptive statistics.
Wave 1
Wave 2
M(SD) or %
M(SD) or %
Age
Marital status (single ¼ 1)
Employment status (employed ¼ 1)
Education years
Monthly income (KRW)
General media use (the average of print media, TV, and the Internet)
Selfie-taking (per week)
Social media use (the average of eight social media platform)
Public self-consciousness
Satisfaction with facial appearance
Comparison with friends
Comparison with influencers/celebrities
Selfie-editing
29.30(5.32)
69.6%
66.4%
14.86(1.76)
4,313,000(2,457,700)
1.17(0.32)
2.03(2.65)
1.91(1.46)
3.62(0.58)
2.85(0.60)
2.29(1.03)
1.97(1.07)
2.51(1.26)
29.53(5.23)
68.5%
71.7%
14.92(1.76)
4,311,400(2,477,300)
1.21(0.30)
1.86(2.31)
1.82(1.43)
3.60(0.55)
2.84(0.60)
2.33(1.00)
1.94(1.04)
2.49(1.27)
Total N
1064
782
374
J. Chae / Computers in Human Behavior 66 (2017) 370e376
with social comparison behavior at W1 and selfie-editing frequency at W1 and W2. Satisfaction with facial appearance at W1
was correlated with neither social comparison (W1) nor selfieediting (W1 and W2). See Table 2.
Then a path analysis using maximum likelihood estimator was
conducted using Mplus 7.11. To handle the missing values across
W1 and W2, the analysis adopted full information maximum
likelihood method. To test the effects of IVs on the mediator, two
types of social comparison behavior (with friends, with influencers/celebrities) at W1 was regressed on four IVs at W1. Then
the DV at W2 was regressed on all IVs, the mediator, controls, and
the DV at W1. The indirect effect was tested via bootstrapping
(Hayes, 2013).
The model fit was examined based on Hu and Bentler's criterion
(1999), which suggested that a good model should have a root
mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) of 0.06, a
comparative fit index (CFI) of 0.95, and a standardized root mean
square residual (SRMR) < than 0.08. The model perfectly fit the
data: c2 (11) ¼ 48.11, p < 0.001, RMSEA ¼ 0.056, CFI ¼ 0.979, and
SRMR ¼ 0.019. Only the DV at W1 and social comparison with
friends at W1 were significant predictors of the DV at W2, supporting H1. Social comparison with influencers/celebrities did not
predict selfie-editing frequency at W2 (R1). Regarding the relationships between four IVs and two types of social comparison
behavior (with friends, with influencers/celebrities), selfie-taking
frequency, social media use, and public self- consciousness at W1
were all positively associated with both types of social comparison
at W1. Satisfaction with facial appearance was not related to any
type of social comparison. H2 through H4 were supported but H5
was not. For unstandardized path coefficients and standard errors,
see Fig. 1.
The indirect effect was tested using bootstrapping. The bootstrapped confidence interval (5000 resample) indicated that
selfie-taking frequency at W1 indirectly increases selfie-editing at
W2 through social comparison of appearance with friends when
editing frequency at W1 was controlled for (95% CI: 0.003, 0.024).
The path from public self-consciousness / social comparison
with friends / selfie editing (CI: 0.018, 0.117) and the path from
social media / social comparison with friends / selfie editing
(CI: 0.003, 0.025) and were also significant. These three IVs
increased selfie-editing frequency at W2 also through selfieediting frequency at W1. In other words, selfie-taking frequency
(CI: 0.069, 0.120) public self-consciousness (CI: 0.165, 0.341), and
social media use (CI: 0.046, 0.116) were associated with editing
frequency at W1, which increased editing frequency at W2. The
three IVs' indirect effects through social comparison with influencers/celebrities were not significant (R2, R3, R4). Thus, H6, H7
and H8 were supported. Because satisfaction with facial appearance did not predict social comparison behavior, its indirect effect
was not tested (H9 and R5).
6. Discussion
This paper has examined a pathway from individual characteristics to selfie-editing behavior through social comparison. The
results showed that selfie-taking frequency, public selfconsciousness, and social media use at W1 indirectly increased
selfie-editing frequency at W2 through social comparison with
friends at W1 but not through comparison with influencers/celebrities. Satisfaction with facial appearance had neither direct nor
indirect effects on selfie-editing. In addition, although the aforementioned three significant IVs were positively associated with
selfie-editing at W1, which in turn increased selfie-editing at W2,
they did not directly influence selfie-editing at W2. The results have
the following implications:
First, individuals edit their selfies not because they are dissatisfied with their appearance, but because they want to look better
than others or at least look like others based on social comparison.
That is, even good-looking individuals still edit their selfies to post
perfect ones. The effect of selfie-taking frequency and social media
use on selfie-editing through social comparison can be explained in
two ways. As mentioned, it might be due to more exposure to
selfies. Those who often take selfies have more opportunity to
scrutinize their own appearance, which leads them to social comparison for evaluation or improvement. Likewise, greater use of
social media implies more exposure to others' selfies, which brings
about social comparison. However, it can be explained as personality characteristics of selfie takers and social media users. As
mentioned, frequent selfie takers and heavy social media users are
likely to be extraverts and narcissists. Moreover, this personalitybased explanation is more persuasive when taking into public
self-consciousness into account; three significant IVs have common
grounds.
Then, based on the results, it is possible to define people who
edit their selfies. They are comparison-oriented people with high
public self-consciousness who frequently take selfies and use social
media. They are a type of people who want more social interaction
than introverts but they are not emotionally attached to such interactions. Rather, the interaction is necessary to keep their inflated
self-views, and to know others' perception on them. They edit
selfies to maintain a positive concept about the self regardless of
their actual appearance. In the current study, as a further evidence,
social media use and selfie-taking were positively correlated with
satisfaction, with facial appearance; in other words, they believe
they look okay, but still want to look better online.
Second, this study extended social comparison theory. The results showed that three IVs (i.e., selfie-taking, social media use, and
public self-consciousness) were all associated with both social
comparisons with friends and influencer/celebrities at W1, but only
comparison with friends at W1 increased selfie-editing at W2.
Social comparison can happen even when individuals know that
Table 2
Bivariate correlations.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Selfie-taking frequency
Public self-consciousness
Social media use
Satisfaction with facial appearance
Comparison with friends
Comparison with influencers or celebrities
Selfie editing at W1
Selfie editing at W2
1
2
3
4
5
6
0.19***
0.44***
0.19***
0.34***
0.35***
0.39***
0.27***
0.17***
0.03
0.33***
0.31***
0.26***
0.19***
0.13***
0.27***
0.28***
0.30***
0.24***
0.01
0.02
0.03
0.01
0.67***
0.32***
0.32***
0.31***
0.27***
7
0.71***
*
Note. All variables except the dependent variable (i.e., selfie editing frequency at W2) were measured at W1; Displayed values are Pearson correlation coefficients; p < 0.05;
**
p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.
J. Chae / Computers in Human Behavior 66 (2017) 370e376
375
Fig. 1. Results. Displayed values are unstandardized coefficients and standard errors; Control variables and selfie-editing frequency at Wave 1 was used in the analysis but not
shown in the figure; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.
the comparison is not appropriate (Gilbert et al., 1995). Females
compare their bodies to those of celebrities who have a professional
obligation to maintain a particular appearance. This study
confirmed that females compare their appearance with those of
influencers/celebrities although such comparison is not appropriate and non-diagnostic. However, that comparison does not increase selfie-editing behavior. The result highlights the purpose of
selfie-editing in the social media world. This paper, consistent with
previous studies, defined selfie-editing as an effort for the online
presentation of the ideal self. Unlike real plastic surgery, a perfectly
edited new self exists only in the virtual world. It is not real and it is
just for the audience online. The findings of this study imply that
we need “audience” to provide positive reactions for selfpresentation. Although selfies can be consumed just for oneself,
editing behavior suggests that we want audience to check the
digitally enhanced image and react to that image with likes and
comments (Chua & Chang, 2016). Although celebrities and influencers have an impact on non-celebrity females, they cannot be the
audience of our enhanced images.
Third, the findings have provided room to think about the outcomes of selfie-editing. It is possible that the selfie-editing phenomenon might negatively influence both presenters and
audiences in online presentation of selfies. For presenters (individuals who frequently edit their own selfies) the discrepancy
between reality and ideal might be problematic. Halpern et al.
(2017) demonstrated a positive association between selfie-taking
and self-idealization. Individuals who often take selfies are likely
to have an idealized virtual self-image, which might create
discrepancy between reality and ideal. If the person not only takes
selfies but also edits them, the discrepancy might become greater.
As stated, selfie-editing functions as a virtual makeover that has an
instant effect on self-image. In such situations, there are two options. Some will get more and more immersed in their virtual image. Others will reduce the gap between reality and ideal by an
actual makeover; plastic surgeons have witnessed the rise of selfiecaused plastic surgery (American Academy of Facial Plastic and
Reconstructive Surgery, 2014).
Similarly, to audience, exposed to others' edited selfies, selfieediting might boost females' desire to change their facial appearance. Borges (2011) showed that exposure to advertisements containing a photoshopped image of a female induced favorable
evaluation about the product among young women, but the
exposure also reduced women's self-esteem and increased their
desire to change their appearance. Similarly, regardless how they
actually look, the selfie phenomenon gives more pressure on females' concern about their appearance. Therefore, selfie-editing, an
instant virtual makeover that creates ideal self-image, might serve
as a way to perpetuate beauty-driven society.
7. Limitations and suggestions for future research
This study has several limitations. The result should be interpreted with caution because the participants were limited to
Korean female smartphone users aged 20 to 39. This study used
online panels who volunteered for the survey. Its non-probability
nature does not allow generalization of the results to the
different context. However, to make up for the weakness, this study
used longitudinal data collected from relatively large number of
participants. Future research may consider other age groups or
include males to confirm the predictors of selfie-editing. Also, this
study focused on the predictors of selfie-editing, and the results of
selfie-editing was mentioned only based on previous studies.
Future research should examine the cultural meaning of selfieediting and test whether selfie-editing actually increases plastic
surgery or the intention to undergo surgery.
Acknowledgements
This work was funded by the National University of Singapore.
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Running head: LITERATURE REVIEW INSTRUCTIONS, RUBRIC, CHECKLIST &
EXAMPLE OF PAPER
1
Instructions for Paper I: Study One Literature Review Instructions (Worth 25 Points)
Ryan J. Winter
Florida International University
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
2
Purpose of Paper I: Study One Literature Review
1). Psychological Purpose
This paper serves several purposes, the first of which is helping you gain insight into
research papers in psychology. As this may be your first time reading and writing papers
in psychology, one goal of Paper I is to give you insight into what goes into such papers.
This study one-lit review will help you a). better understand the psychology topic chosen
for the course this semester (Selfies), b). learn about the various sections of an empirical
research report by reading five peer-reviewed articles (that is, articles that have a Title
Page, Abstract, Literature Review, Methods Section, Results Section, and References
Page), and c). use information gathered from research articles in psychology to help
support your hypotheses for your first study this semester (Selfies). Of course, you’ll be
doing a study two literature review later in the semester, so think of this Paper I as the
first part of your semester long paper. I recommend looking at the example Paper V,
actually, to see what your final paper will look like. It might give you a better idea about
how this current paper (as well as Papers II, III, and IV) all fit together into your final
paper of the semester.
In this current paper (Paper I), you will read five research articles, summarize what the
authors did and what they found, and use those summaries to support your Selfie Study
hypothesis. IMPORTANT: Yes you need five references, but keep in mind that you can
spend a lot of time (a page or two!) summarizing one them and just a sentence or two
summarizing others. Thus spend more time on the more relevant articles!
For this paper, start your paper broadly and then narrow your focus (think about the
hourglass example provided in the lecture). My suggestion is to give a brief overview of
your paper topic in your opening paragraph, hinting at the research variables you plan to
look at for study one. Your next paragraphs will review prior research (those five
references required for this paper). Make sure to draw connections between these papers,
using smooth transitions between paragraphs. Your final paragraphs should use the
research you just summarized to support your research hypothesis. And yes, that means
you MUST include your study predictions (which we provided in the researcher
instructions and debriefing statement. Use them!). In other words, this first paper will
look like the literature reviews for the five research articles you are summarizing for this
assignment. Use those articles as examples! See what they did and mimic their style!
Here, though, you will end the paper after providing your hypothesis. In Paper II, you
will pick the topic up again, but in that future paper you will talk about your own study
methods and results.
2). APA Formatting Purpose
The second purpose of Paper I: Study One Literature Review is to teach you proper
American Psychological Association (APA) formatting. In the instructions below, I tell
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
3
you how to format your paper using APA style. There are a lot of very specific
requirements in APA papers, so pay attention to the instructions below as well as Chapter
14 in your textbook!
3). Writing Purpose
Finally, this paper is intended to help you grow as a writer. Few psychology classes give
you the chance to write papers and receive feedback on your work. This class will! We
will give you extensive feedback on your first few paper in terms of content, spelling,
and grammar. You will even be able to revise aspects of Paper I and include them in
future papers (most notably Papers III and V). My hope is that you craft a paper that
could be submitted to an empirical journal. Thus readers may be familiar with APA style
but not your specific topic. Your job is to educate them on the topic and make sure they
understand how your study design advances the field of psychology.
In fact, your final paper in this class (Paper V), might be read by another professor at
FIU and not your instructor / lab assistant. Write your paper for that reader - the one
who may know NOTHING about your topic and your specific study.
Note: The plagiarism limit for this paper is 30% (though this excludes any overlap your paper
might have with regard to citations, references, and the predictions). Make sure your paper falls
under 30% (or 35% if including predictions).
Note: I am looking for 2.5 pages minimum with predictions.
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
4
Instructions for Paper I: Study One Literature Review (Worth 25 Points)
Students: Below are lengthy instructions on how to write your study one literature review. There
is also a checklist document in Canvas, which I recommend you print out and “check off” before
submitting your paper (we are sticklers for APA format, so make sure it is correct! We mark off
if you have a misplaced “&”, so carefully review all of your work and use the checklist! It will
help). Also look at the example paper in Canvas. It will show you what we expect.
1. Title Page: I expect the following format. (5 Points)
a. You must have a header and page numbers on each page.
i. If you don’t know how to insert headers, ask your instructor or watch this
very helpful video! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY.
ii. The header goes at the top of the paper and it is left justified.
1. Use “Insert Headers” or click on the top of the page to open the
header. Make sure to select the “Different first page” option so that
your title page header will differ from subsequent pages
2. The R in Running head is capitalized but the “h” is lower case,
followed by a colon and a short title (in ALL CAPS). This short
running head title can be the same one as the rest of your paper or
it can differ – the choice is yours, but it should be no more than 50
characters including spaces and punctuation
3. Insert a page number as well. The header is flush left, but the page
number is flush right.
iii. Want an example header? Look at the title page of these instructions! You
can use other titles depending on your own preferences (e.g. SOCIAL
MEDIA AND NARCISSISM; SEFLIES VS. GROUPIES; JUDGING
OTHERS; etc.).
b. Your Title should be midway up the page. Again, see my “Title” page above as an
example of the placement, but for your title try to come up with a title that helps
describe your study one. Avoid putting “Paper One”. Rather, consider the titles
you saw in PsycInfo. Create a similar title that lets the reader know what your
paper is about
c. Your name (First Last) and the name of your institution (FIU) beneath the title.
For this class, only your own name will go on this paper. Double space
everything!
i. You can also refer to Chapter 14 in your powerpoints and/or Smith and
Davis textbook
d. This Title Page section will be on page 1
2. Abstract?
a. You DO NOT need an abstract for Paper I: You cannot write it until you run both
study one and two, so omit it for now
3. Literature Review Section (12 points)
a. First page of your literature review (Page 2)
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
5
i. Proper header with page numbers. Your running head title will appear in
the header of your page WITHOUT the phrase “Running head”. To insert
this header, use the headers program.
ii. The title of your paper should be on the first line of page two, centered. It
is IDENTICAL to the title on your title page. Just copy and paste it!
iii. The beginning text for your paper follows on the next line
b. Citations for the literature review
i. Your paper must cite a minimum of five (5) empirical research articles
that are based on studies conducted in psychology. That is, each of the
three citations you use should have a literature review, a methods section,
a results section, a conclusion/discussion, and references.
1. For this first paper, you MUST use at least three of the five articles
provided in the blackboard folder. You can use four if you like, but
you must use three at minimum – however, you cannot use all five.
For that fifth article, you must find it using PsycInfo. There are
some other conditions for this fifth article that you must follow:
a. First, remember that the fifth article cannot be any of the
five found in the blackboard folder.
b. Second, for your fifth article, it can be based on a wide
variety of topics, including general priming studies, studies
on narcissism (without a social media angle), studies on
social media (without a narcissism angle), studies on
impression formation, studies on friendships, etc. Trust me,
there are TONS of topics that can help you in your paper.
Just choose one that will help you support your
experimental hypothesis for your Selfie study. That is, it
has to help you justify your study one hypothesis (all
students are using this same hypothesis, so make sure to
read it. You can find it in the researcher instructions along
with the questionnaires you are giving to participants. I
actually suggest copying and pasting that hypothesis into
this first paper at the end).
c. Finally, you can have more than five references if you
want, but you must have a minimum of five references.
ii. Proper citations must be made in the paper – give credit where credit is
due, and don’t make claims that cannot be validated.
iii. If you use a direct quote, make sure to provide a page number for where
you found that quote in the citations. Do not directly quote too often,
though. You can have no more than three direct quotes in the whole
paper (though zero quotes would be even better). Instead, I would like
you to paraphrase when possible.
c. Requirements for the information in your literature review
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
6
i. Your study one literature review should use prior research as a starting
point, narrowing down the main theme of your specific project – think
about the hourglass example I gave in class.
ii. The last part of your literature review should narrow down your focus onto
your own study, eventually ending in your study hypothesis. However,
DO NOT go into specific details about your methods. You will talk about
your specific methods in Paper II in a few weeks.
iii. Again, to make it clear, at the end of your paper you will give an overview
of your research question, providing your specific predictions/hypotheses.
d. The literature review must have minimum of two (2) full pages NOT
INCLUDING THE HYPOTHESES. It has a maximum of five (5) pages (thus,
with the title page and references page, the paper should be between 4.5 and 7
pages). If it is only four and a half pages (again, including the hypotheses), it
better be really, really good. I don’t think I could do this paper justice in fewer
than five pages, so if yours isn’t at least five pages, I doubt it will get a good
grade.
4. References (6 points)
a. The References section starts on its own page, with the word References centered.
Use proper APA format in this section or you will lose points.
b. All five references that you cited in the literature review must be in this section
(there should be more than five references here if you cited more than five
articles, which is fine in this paper). However, at least three must come from the
article folder on blackboard while the remaining two can come from either the last
blackboard paper or two new ones from psychinfo. Only peer-reviewed articles
are allowed here (no books, journals, websites, or other secondary resources are
allowed for paper one).
c. For references, make sure you:
i. use alphabetical ordering (start with the last name of the first author)
ii. use the authors’ last names but only the initials of their first/middle name
iii. give the date in parentheses – e.g. (2007).
iv. italicize the name of the journal article
v. give the volume number, also in italics
vi. give the page numbers (not italicized) for articles
vii. provide the doi (digital object identifier) if present (not italicized)
5. Writing Quality (2 Points)
a. This includes proper grammar and spelling. I recommend getting feedback on
your paper from the Pearson Writer program prior uploading it on Canvas.
6. Between the title page, literature review, and reference page, I expect a minimum of 4
pages and a maximum of 7 pages for this assignment. But like I said, the shorter the
paper, the less likely it is to get a good grade, so aim for 5 pages minimum.
The above information is required for your paper, but I wanted to provide a few tips about
writing your literature review as well. Students often struggle with the first paper, but hopefully
this will give you some good directions:
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
7
•
First, remember that you need 5 references, all of which MUST be peer-reviewed (three
coming from the blackboard folder and one or two that you find on your own using
PsycInfo).
•
Second, I don't expect a lengthy discussion for each and every article that you cite. You
might spend a page talking about Article A and a sentence or two on Article B. The
amount of time you spend describing an article you read should be proportional to how
important it is in helping you defend your hypotheses. See if there is a prior study that
looks a lot like yours (hint – there is at least one, which I based this study on, but you’ll
have to find it on your own!). I would expect you to spend more time discussing that
prior research since it is hugely relevant to your own study. If an article you read simply
supports a global idea that ties into your study but has very different methods (like
"frustrated people get mad!"), you can easily mention it in a sentence or two without
delving into a lot of detail. Tell a good story in your literature review, but only go into
detail about plot elements that have a direct bearing on your study!
•
Third, this paper is all about supporting your hypotheses. Know what your hypotheses are
before you write the paper, as it will help you determine how much time to spend on each
article you are citing. My suggestion is to spend some time describing the nature of
selfies and narcissism, and then talking about studies that looked at this area. Use those
studies to help defend your own study hypothesis. That is, “Since they found X in this
prior study, that helps support the hypothesis in the present study”. Do you remember
your two hypotheses? Okay, I’ll be really helpful here. BELOW are your hypotheses. In
your paper, support it! Just remember that the rest of your paper needs to be at least two
full pages NOT INCLUDING the hypothesis below. In other words, including the
hypotheses below, your actual text for your paper should be at least two and a half pages!
o We predict that if participants are exposed to selfie photos, then they will believe
that an Instagram user 1). updates her profile picture more frequently, 2). posts to
her social media accounts more often, and 3). seems more self-absorbed, selfish,
narcissistic, and egotistical, compared to participants exposed to either groupie or
professional photos, though these latter two conditions should not differ from
each other in their Instagram user ratings.
•
Fourth, make sure to proofread, proofread, proofread! Use the Pearson Writer for help,
but note that their suggestions are just that – suggestions. It is up to you to make sure the
flow of the paper is easy to understand. Good luck!
•
Finally, go look at the supporting documents for this paper. There is a checklist, a grade
rubric, and an example paper. All will give you more information about what we are
specifically looking for as well as a visual example of how to put it all together. Good
luck!
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
Paper I: Study One Literature Review - Grading Rubric (25 points)
1). Title Page (5 points – 1 page)
Items of relevance:
Proper APA formatted Running head in header with page numbers
Student name and Institution
2). Abstract / Graphs / Tables (Not Required – No Points)
3). Literature Review (12 points – 2 to 5 pages not including the hypotheses)
Items of relevance:
a). Psychological Purpose: Your paper will meet the psychological objectives for this section,
including:
1). narrowing your paper from general information toward the beginning to specific
information towards the end (tells a story)
2). presenting the information clearly, educating your reader about the area of research
(keep in mind that this area may be new to them as well. Assume they need you to
teach them the material). You should have smooth transitions between paragraphs.
3). ending your paper with your specific hypotheses / predictions
b). APA Formatting Purpose: Your paper will meet the formatting objectives for this section,
including:
1). proper APA formatting for title, header, and page numbers
2). You should have five citations (minimum) that match up with the references in your
reference section. Citations are in proper APA format
8
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
4) Reference Section (6 points)
Items of relevance:
Five references minimum (same as those cited) in proper APA format. Three references MUST
come from blackboard; a fourth MUST come from your own research the fifth can come
from either blackboard or from research you do on your own
5). Writing Quality (2 points)
a). Writing Purpose: Your paper will meet the writing objectives for this section, including:
1). Proper grammar and spelling, good flow to the paper, good transition sentences
between paragraphs
Note: Use the Paper Checklist, too! It is much more detailed then this grading rubric!
9
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
10
Checklist – Paper One: Study One Literature Review
Use the check sheet below to make sure your paper is the best it can be! Make sure you answer “Yes” to
all questions before submitting your paper or you will lose points!
General Paper Format
Yes
No
1. Is everything in your paper (including headers, the main body of your study
one literature review, and references) in 12 point Times New Roman font?
2. Is everything in your paper double spaced, including references (here I mean
the spacing above and below each line, not the spaces following a period)?
3. Do you have one inch margins on all sides of the paper (one inch from the top
of the page, one inch from the bottom, and one inch from each side)
4. Are the first lines of all paragraphs indented roughly ½ inch?
5. Are your paragraphs aligned left? (That is, text should be flush left, with lines
lining up on the left of the page, but text should NOT line up on the right side
of the page – it should look ragged)
6. Do you need help figuring out how to configure a word document in APA
format (inserting headers, page numbers, proper indents, etc.)? If YES or NO,
I highly recommend watching this video which walks you through setting up
an APA formatted paper! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY
Yes
No
Title page
Header
1. Do you have the phrase “Running head” in your header (with a lower case h)?
2. Is the rest of your Running head title in ALL CAPS?
3. Is your Running head in 12 point Times New Roman font?
4. Do you have a page number that is flush right (also in 12 point Times New
Roman font)?
5. Is your header 50 characters or less (including spaces and punctuation)?
Title / Name / Institution
1. Is your title 12 words or less (as recommended by the APA)?
2. Does your title describe your general paper theme (while avoiding something
blank like “Paper One: Literature Review”)? Note that your header and title
can differ!
3. Do all title words with three letters or more start with a capital letter?
4. Are your name and institution correct?
5. Are your title, name, and institution elements centered and in 12 point Times
New Roman font?
Literature Review
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
Header
1. Is your header title present and identical to your header from the title page?
2. Is your header title in ALL CAPS and 12 point Times New Roman font?
3. Does your header on this second page omit the phrase “Running head”
4. Do you have a page number starting on page 2
Title for the literature review
1. Do you have the identical title you used on the title page rewritten at the top
of your literature review?
2. Is this title centered?
Main body of the literature review
1. Does your literature review start broadly, giving a brief overview of the paper
to come?
2. Does your literature review start to narrow down toward your hypotheses?
3. Do your paragraphs transition from one to the next? (That is, avoid simply
listing studies you read. Tie them together. How does Study A in paragraph A
relate to Study B in paragraph B?)
4. Does your paper end in your very specific hypotheses? (You will lose a lot of
points if your paper doesn’t provide the specific predictions!)
5. Did you make sure your predictions are written in the past tense?
6. Is your paper at least two pages long (not including the hypotheses)?
Citations for the literature review
1. Did you cite a minimum of 5 citations? (Note that you can give a lot of detail
for some articles you cite but only a sentence or two for others. How much
detail you go into depends on how important the article is in helping your
support your hypotheses)
2. Are your citations in APA format (That is, ONLY the last name of the
author(s) and date of publication)?
a. Note that you do NOT include first names, initials, or the title of the article
the authors wrote when citing. That information belongs in the references
pages only.
b. Also note that you only use an ampersand – the & symbol – when it occurs
within parentheses. In other instances, use the word “and”
3. If you quoted, did you provide a page number for the direct quote?
4. If you paraphrased in any way, did you cite the source of that information?
5. Did you cite everything that sounded like it was factual information?
6. Did you make sure the period follows the citation rather than coming before it?
References Page
Title for the references page
1. Do references start on their own page?
2. Is the word “References” centered?
References – Make sure these are in APA format!
1. Are references listed in alphabetical order (starting with the last name of the
first author listed)?
2. Are all citations from the literature review referenced?
3. Is the first line of the reference flush left while subsequent lines are indented
11
PAPER II: METHODS AND RESULTS INSTRUCTIONS
(Note: Use the ruler function for this. DO NOT simply tab)?
4. Did you use the “&” symbol when listing more than one author name?
5. Did you include the date of publication
6. For article references, is the article title (which is not italicized) present, with
only the first word and proper names starting with a capital letter?
7. For article references, is the name of the journal present with all major words
starting with a capital letter (Note: this journal title is italicized)?
8. For article references, is the volume number italicized
9. For article references, are the page numbers present (not italicized)
10. For article references, is the DOI present
Yes
No
Writing Quality
1. Did you proofread your paper, go to the writing center, go to the research
methods help center, or use the Pearson writer to make sure your paper flows
well?
2. Did you use the past tense (which is recommended, since your papers in this
class will reflect work you already did rather than work you will do...
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