The Relationship between Individual Socio-psychological Factors and Instagram Image Features

Abstract

The main objective of the present study was to examine the relationship between the characteristics of photos uploaded on Instagram and the user's social psychological traits. Data were collected from 63 participants. Each participant's social psychological traits (i.e., social comparison orientation, public self-consciousness, narcissism, self-esteem, and social anxiety) were measured using a survey questionnaire. In addition, the photos that the participants had uploaded on Instagram during the past three months from the start of data collection were also collected. We used Google Vision API to analyze the characteristics of the photos, which included the brightness and saturation of photos, ratio of portrait photos, that of portrait photos that contained joyful faces, and ratio of solo photos. A set of regression analyses revealed that 1) individuals with high social comparison orientation tended to upload less saturated photos and more portrait photos, 2) users with high social anxiety were less likely to upload solo photos, 3) people with high public self-consciousness likely uploaded more solo photos and more bright photos, and 4) people with high self-esteem tended to upload more joyful photos. These results imply that the characteristics of photos uploaded on social media platforms are likely to reflect user's social psychological traits. The implications of the findings were discussed in the text.