The selfies you take could reveal some truths about your personality
People who pursed their lips together into a “duck face” or partially hid themselves were seen as more likely to be neurotic
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Your support makes all the difference.The type of selfies you take may paint a picture of your personality rather than just your face, according to a new study.
Lin Qiu, a professor of psychology at Nanyang Technological University, asked over 120 users of a Chinese social media site, similar to Twitter, who had taken a selfie to complete a personality questionnaire.
Their selfies were then examined by over 100 Chinese students who were asked to make their own judgements about the selfie-takers' personalities.
The students were asked to rate each selfie based on 13 traits including whether the poser adopted a “duck face”, looked at the camera and whether there was evidence of editing in the pictures.
Their findings, published in Computers and Human Behaviour and reported by Research Digest, found that a number of selfie traits correlated with the participants personalities.
They found that those who scored higher in agreeableness and friendliness were more likely to smile and laugh in their sefies, and to hold the camera in a lower position. Those who scored higher in the “open-to-experience” category were also more likely to post more positive selfies.
The picture-takers who scored higher in conscientiousness were less likely to reveal their location in the background of their picture, while the participants who possessed more neurotic and emotionally unstable traits were more likely to pull a “duck face” pout.
Overall the students examining the selfies presumed that people who expressed more positive emotions and looked directly at the camera were more likely to be friendly.
Despite these correlations, it was also established that the assumptions made by the students were not accurate enough to make hugely meaningful inferences about the selfie-takers' personalities.
A further study by researchers at Ohio State University found that men who posted more photos of themselves on social media were more likely to score higher on levels of narcissism and psychopathy.
Men who edited their selfies also scored higher in levels of self-objectification, a trait linked with valuing yourself mainly for your appearance.
The study's lead author Jesse Fox said she believes there is a self-reinforcing cycle when it comes to self-objectification.
People who score higher on self-objectification post more selfies, which leads to more feedback from friends online and encourages them to post even more photos of themselves, she explained.
“It may make people objectify themselves even more,” she said.
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