The zoom dysmorphia it is the preoccupation with our own image projected on the screen. During the pandemic, and due to the increase in video calls and telematic meetings, these types of concerns increased exponentially. This was mainly due to two reasons: spending hours watching ourselves in motion and seeing ourselves through a camera, which always shows us a different image of ourselves than we really are.
Seeing ourselves for a long time through a camera is a relatively new situation, to which our minds were not used to. And less so before people who are not from our family or from our close circle of friends.
the mirror vs. the screen
What situations did we count on until now to receive information about our appearance? Basically the mirror and the reaction of others when we talk to them.
When we look at ourselves in the mirror, we see ourselves ecstatic and automatically put on our best face. But that is very different from seeing ourselves in motion and noticing how we frown when we get angry, how we squint when we want to concentrate, or how our nose turns red when we are nervous. They are unique opportunities to discover that we don’t like our smile or that our state of mind reflects much more than we thought.
When we speak face to face with another person we are not seeing each other. If we are concerned about our image, we will try to guess what we look like by the signals that our interlocutor sends us, but this information will always be more diffuse than when we see ourselves for a long time through a camera.
The 3 phases of dysmorphia
The term dysmorphia it means that the mind distorts the image that a person has of himself. Thus, when it is seen for a long time through a camera, it will go through these three phases:
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A filter of the image itself is made: suddenly, we begin to notice that pimple, those slightly drooping eyelids or that little wrinkle that we had hardly noticed before.
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The negative trait that has been detected is magnified: the double chin that we didn’t even see before has become enormous, the slightly protruding ears become grotesque and the granite is so noticeable that it is the only thing we see when we look at our faces.
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It generalizes: it is no longer just that trait that worries me, it is that, suddenly, it seems that all of me am some eyes with bags, my face is only characterized by a prominent nose or I look like an 80-year-old man.
These mechanisms are normal in all of us. In general, after a while the mind gets used to seeing itself and the person no longer cares or notices the image returned by the camera.
But this situation can become dangerous if we continue to pay attention again and again to the image we see.
Compulsive analysis of our image
What are the dangers of falling into zoom dysmorphia? The immediate effect is that we begin to obsess over the image we are giving, to observe ourselves compulsively and to be thinking about our appearance before, during and even after the video call.
A clear sign is to see that we are losing our naturalness: if we have discovered that we do not like our teeth when we smile, we will try to smile with our mouth closed or not smile at all. Another is the loss of time: we will invest more time than before in grooming ourselves, painting ourselves, hiding that small defect.
Surely, when we participate in a video call we will be more focused on observing our appearance than on the content of the meeting, and we may even lose the thread of the conversation or, in any case, not be as focused as we could be.
Our self-esteem will suffer severely. If before we had linked our image to our self-esteem, now that only we see the negative of our appearance, self-esteem will drop substantially. And, finally, we can end up spending our money on buying rings of light or lamps that enhance our image and we will tend to invest more than before in beauty products or image advice.
There are more and more people who go to an aesthetic clinic to undergo various operations that make it look like your filtered image By the computer. The worrying thing about this is that the hobby of retouching the image can become an addiction, because, very obviously, no matter how much we operate, we will never be satisfied with our image, since the problem is deeper.
In short, the concern for the image will occupy an increasingly prominent place and space in our minds, until we sometimes lose hobbies or social relationships that we had before.
The relationship with self-esteem
When there is low self-esteem, we have externalized our value. This means that we depend on the approval of the people around us to feel worthy of being loved, accepted or recognized. We do not feel that we are worth simply for being us.
When you have value externalized, you depend almost one hundred percent on the image you give yourself, which must necessarily be favorable to others. Sometimes, we try to show our worth by giving the image of workers, other times by giving the image of winners and, unfortunately, too many times we try to be loved and accepted simply for appearing handsome or with a good figure.
when we become obsessive of our image We tend to compulsively compare ourselves to other people. And there the internet does us a disservice.
Since it is a self-esteem problem, we should go to a psychologist as soon as we notice that our thoughts revolve around our image for too long. The zoom dysmorphia It is a good opportunity to finally face that self-esteem problem that we have surely been dragging for a long time.
Strategies to avoid worrying too much
On a more superficial level, you can follow these tips:
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Don’t look! If you can’t stop glancing back and forth at your image, cover it up with a post-it or a piece of paper while you’re on the video call.
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Put yourself in the place of others: do you really think that they have met with you to analyze the imperfections of your face? Chances are your interlocutors are more interested in the content of what you are saying than in anything else.
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Regardless of how our self-esteem is, in a group we tend to be more aware of ourselves, our appearance, how we fall and the impact of our comments than others. Think that there are many people who suffer from their image and perhaps your interlocutor is one of them.
In short, it is not worth worrying so much about the image we are giving. There are much more interesting matters!
Olga Castanyer Mayer-SpiessPsychologist Professor in the Master in Emotional Intelligence, UNIR – International University of La Rioja
This article was originally published on The Conversation. read the original.