Natural speed please
TEXT 2: Social media, selfies and addiction. Can selfies become an addiction?
In March 2014, the UK's Daily Mirror published the story of Danny Bowman, a teenage "selfie addict" who allegedly spent up to 10 hours a day taking 200 selfies, dropped out of school, and tried to kill himself when he was unable to take the perfect photo of himself. Taking selfies has become a very popular activity, particularly among teenagers and young adults. However, selfie-taking is more than just the taking of a photograph and can include the editing of the color and contrast, changing backgrounds, and adding other effects, before uploading the picture onto a social media platform. These options and the use of editing has further popularized selfie-taking behavior. From a psychological perspective, the taking of selfies is a self-oriented action which allows users to establish their individuality and self-importance and is also associated with personality traits such as narcissism. In an interview for the Daily Mirror, Danny Bowman explained:
“I was constantly in search of taking the perfect selfie and when I realized I couldn’t, I wanted to die. I lost my friends, my education, my health and almost my life. The only thing I cared about was having my phone with me so I could satisfy the urge to capture a picture of myself at any time of the day. It’s a real problem like drugs, alcohol or gambling. People don’t realize when they post a picture of themselves on Facebook or Twitter it can so quickly spiral out of control. People would comment on [my selfies], but children can be cruel. One told me my nose was too big for my face and another picked on my skin. I started taking more and more to try to get the approval of my friends. I would be so high when someone wrote something nice but gutted when they wrote something unkind. It almost took my life, but I survived and I am determined never to get into that position again.”
Bowman was diagnosed as having body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), a distressing, handicapping preoccupation with an imagined or slight defect in body appearance that the sufferer perceives to be ugly, unattractive, or deformed. (…)
