From Defense to Promotion: The Impact of Broad-Aesthetic Commentary on Female Body Image on Short-Video Platforms

Social media platforms often feature comments that focus on appearance, and such interactions can easily lead to issues related to women’s body image. To address this issue, we conducted research on short-video platforms to explore the potential of using broad aesthetic-related comments as a strategy for mitigating these problems. Two hundred sixteen women were randomly divided into three groups. Each group watched short videos featuring idealized body images, accompanied by different types of comments: positive comments regarding appearance alone, positive comments regarding appearance along with broad aesthetic-related comments, and neutral comments. The results showed that compared to the neutral group, simply viewing positive comments regarding appearance significantly reduced satisfaction with one’s body and increased negative emotions. However, adding broad aesthetic-related comments after the positive appearance-related comments helped to mitigate this negative effect. Additionally, comparisons between different versions of the videos did not reveal any significant differences in outcomes.