The roles of self-compression and self-esteem in the relationship between the usage of dating apps and body satisfaction

Abstract

Studies have reported an increasing number of young adults, regardless of gender and sexual orientation, using dating apps actively. Dating apps with global positional systems (GPS) help people to meet friends, sexual partners, or romantic partners more conveniently and accessible. However, the immediate and image-focused function of dating apps encourages users to evaluate other users based on the impression of the brief self-introduction and physical appearance. Receiving real-time user feedback through likes, matches, or other interactive functions enhances an individual's pressure on appearance. This study examines the influence of dating app usage on body satisfaction and self-esteem and explores whether self-compassion can moderate the effect of dating app use on body satisfaction and self-esteem. The study collected 133 samples of Chinese young adult dating app users in Hong Kong (mean age = 21.7; 50 males and 83 females). The short form of the Self-compassion scale (SCS-SF), the Rosenberg self-esteem scale (RSE), the Adolescent Body Image Satisfaction Scale (ABISS) and the time of using online dating apps were employed in this study. The hypothesised moderation model of this study was examined by the macro “PROCESS” for SPSS. Self-compassion was added as a moderator of the model that affects the relationship between the usage of dating apps and body satisfaction, as well as the relationship between the usage of dating apps and self-esteem. The results showed that the frequency of using dating apps is not related to self-esteem (t=-1.31, p=.19), while selfcompassion is significantly related to it (t=6.90, p<.001). The interaction between the usage of dating apps and self-compassion also does not have a significant effect on self-esteem (t=1.51, p=.13). Meanwhile, the usage of dating apps, self-esteem and self-compassion are all significantly related to body dissatisfaction (t=2.26, p=.03; t=-2.57, p=.01; t=-5.03, p<.001). Using dating apps is positively associated with body dissatisfaction, while self-esteem and self-compassion are negatively related to body dissatisfaction. However, the interaction between the usage of dating apps and self-compassion does not significantly affect body dissatisfaction (t=-1.10, p=.27). The above results imply that using more online dating apps will lead to more body dissatisfaction. In contrast, high self-esteem and high self-compassion can reduce body dissatisfaction. But selfcompression fails to buffer the adverse effects of using dating apps on psychological outcomes. Based on the above results, an additional test was conducted to examine whether self-esteem can be a buffer to the negative effects of using dating apps on body dissatisfaction. The results showed that the interaction between the usage of online dating apps and self-esteem has a significant effect on body dissatisfaction (t=-2.33, p=.02). The usage of online dating apps enhances the body dissatisfaction of participants with low levels of self-esteem (t=2.47, p=.02) while it does not affect the dissatisfaction of participants with high and moderate levels of selfesteem (t=-0.26, p=.79; t=0.74, p=.46). These results suggest that the self-esteem intervention can be delivered to frequent users of online dating apps to mitigate the negative effects of using online dating apps on their body dissatisfaction.