Cybersmile Honor World Mental Health Day 2023 by Launching New Body Image Education Resource

We are excited to announce the launch of our new interactive learning experience focusing on body image, mental health and self-expression on World Mental Health Day 2023.

The resource helps users learn about the impact that social media use can have on their mental as well as physical wellbeing in relation to the way they feel about their bodies. The educational resource provides users with a wide number of learning opportunities that focus on key areas covering body confidence, insecurities, distorted body image, social comparisons, self-criticism, self-validation, mindfulness and self-care.

“The impact of social media on users’ relationships with food, exercise and their own body image is profound. Imagine a friend who, every time you spent time with them, made you feel ashamed, caused you to think less of yourself and even drove you to contemplate body- and life-changing surgery? Our focus as a society needs to be on how we can harness the amazing connectedness and positivity of social media and eliminate the damage it is currently doing to young peoples’ minds and bodies.”

Dr. Deborah Gilboa, Cybersmile Advisory Panel

The new module, which was developed using the findings from Cybersmile’s new Body Beautiful 2023 report has been incorporated into the Cybersmile Education Program, which contains a full curriculum of interactive learning modules focusing on a wide range of issues affecting internet users of all ages. These include topics such as: Mental Health & Social Media, Effective Allyship, Online Safety, Positive Gaming, Digital Civility and many more. Users can explore the full Cybersmile Education Program here.

To coincide with the launch of Cybersmile’s World Mental Health Day activities, a number of content creators and resident experts will be participating to promote key findings from our Body Beautiful 2023 report to inspire important conversations around social media use and its impact on our mental health.

“Our latest Body Beautiful 2023 report shows that half of internet users feel that social media makes them hate their body. We’ve launched our new Body Image resource to help internet users better understand the potential impact that social media can have on their wellbeing, and the importance of understanding how our self-image can become distorted when we compare ourselves to others online.”

Dan Raisbeck, Co-founder, The Cybersmile Foundation

The development of the new Body Image resource was guided by several of our research projects including the recent Comparison Culture 2023 report, Digital Wellbeing 2022 report, a bi-yearly study examining the impact of social media and internet use on Gen Z wellbeing across the UK and our latest Body Beautiful 2023 report examining body image perceptions on social media.

Notable findings from Cybersmile’s Body Beautiful 2023 report include:

• 51% of respondents said that social media makes them feel insecure about their own body
• 50% of respondents said that social media makes them feel that they hate their own body
• 47% of respondents said 
they feel pressure to use filters or tools to edit their appearance on social media images or videos
• 23% of respondents indicated that they have been encouraged to have cosmetic surgery by people they don’t know on social media
• 40% of respondents said social media makes them want to permanently change their body through surgery
• 20% of respondents indicated that social media has a negative impact on their relationship with food
• 55% of respondents said social media makes them feel they need to lose or gain weight
• 15% of respondents said social media negatively affects their exercise habits
• 33% of respondents said the way they feel about their body negatively impacts their mental health
• 56% of respondents said they feel too anxious to share unedited or untouched photos of themselves on social media

Stay tuned for additional activities and announcements from Cybersmile throughout World Mental Health Day.