Charity warns selfie obsession is sapping children’s confidence

Almost a fifth of young people who use social media have changed the way they look in a photo before posting it, research on “selfie culture” in Britain has shown.

A poll commissioned by The Diana Award found that 19 per cent of ten-to-16-year-olds had done so, compared to just 8 per cent of adults.

The Yougov findings were released to mark the charity’s #Mytrueselfie campaign which encourages people to take an unfiltered, unaltered selfie and surround it with positive words or emojis via mytrueselfie.com.

Nearly a quarter of young- 0 Youngsters change the way they look for a selfie sters (24 per cent) have taken more than ten selfies to get the right one, compared to 12 per cent of adults, while one in ten youngsters have altered their appearance because of a selfie they have taken, compared to 7 per cent of adults.

Some 71 per cent of ten to 16-year-olds who use social media believe it makes people think about how they look all of the time, as do 66 per cent of adults, and 44 per cent of youngsters said selfies make people less likely to be happy with the way they look.

Thedianaawardwarned that selfie culture is having a detrimental effect on children’s confidence.

Psychologist Dr Linda Papadopoulos said: “We’ve got to the point that some people feel that they can’t live up to their selfies and this has to change.”