Diachronic study on the relationship between body image, social media use, and active lifestyles in a sample of Italian preadolescents

The pervasive influence of social media on young people's daily lives has captured the attention of numerous researchers and has become a widely discussed topic. With many children and preadolescents engaging with platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat on a daily basis, this constant exposure to digital content increasingly shapes their self-image, body perception, and relationship with their physical appearance. At the same time, these platforms often promote unattainable beauty ideals, creating pressures that extend beyond traditional sociocultural norms to influence personal appearance standards. For those who do not conform to these digitally imposed standards, the result can be a growing sense of body dissatisfaction, isolation, and discomfort with their own physical appearance. Among children and preadolescents, there is a growing tendency to share personal aspects of their lives publicly in pursuit of popularity and social validation—often without full awareness of the risks involved. Given their ongoing cognitive and emotional development, these age groups are particularly susceptible to internalizing unrealistic beauty standards, potentially leading to negative body image, reduced self-esteem, and various psychological challenges. This dissertation explores in depth the relationship between body image development and social media use among Italian primary school children through qualitative research methods that privilege children's own voices, perspectives, and lived experiences. The research is structured around an extensive theoretical framework and three interconnected empirical studies that progressively build knowledge on this critical topic through the authentic accounts of children themselves. The dissertation begins with a comprehensive theoretical foundation that examines body image development from classical theories to contemporary digital contexts, establishing the conceptual framework for understanding how social media influences young people's self-perception and relationship with their bodies. This theoretical introduction provides essential background on the digital transformation of childhood, the mechanisms through which social media affects body image, and the concept of body literacy as an educational approach for promoting positive body relationships. Following this theoretical grounding, the dissertation presents three empirical studies, each addressing different aspects of the research questions through qualitative action research employing focus group methodology. The first study develops a conceptual and educational framework for promoting positive body image among children, identifying critical components including self-awareness, emotional literacy, gender considerations, and the relationship between actual and perceived bodies. The second study investigates how children perceive image stereotypes and how educational interventions can enhance their critical awareness and body literacy. Through focus groups with 111 primary school students, this research examines children's understanding of beauty standards, their experiences with social media, and their responses to workshops designed to deconstruct harmful appearance norms. The third study extends this inquiry through comprehensive longitudinal qualitative research involving 255 primary school students, with intensive focus group discussions conducted with 50 participants across two time points. This investigation tracks changes over time in children's body perceptions, critical media awareness, digital engagement practices, and emotional responses following participation in an eight-workshop body literacy program. All empirical investigations employed focus group methodology as the primary data collection approach, recognizing this method's particular suitability for accessing children's subjective experiences, facilitating peer dialogue about sensitive topics, and generating rich, contextualized data about body image and social media use. Focus groups enabled exploration of how children collectively make sense of appearance pressures, interpret media messages, navigate peer dynamics, and respond to educational interventions within supportive peer contexts. The findings highlight the complex challenges surrounding young people's digital experiences and underscore the critical importance of centering children's voices when studying body image development in the digital age. Results demonstrate that children possess sophisticated awareness of appearance pressures, image manipulation, and beauty standards conveyed through social media. However, they simultaneously struggle to translate this cognitive awareness into sustained behavioral resistance against sociocultural beauty norms due to persistent peer influence, pervasive media messages, and deeply ingrained cultural values around appearance. The research reveals that educational interventions can effectively enhance children's critical media literacy, promote initial attitudinal shifts toward greater body acceptance and appreciation for diversity, and increase recognition of image manipulation techniques. However, sustaining these positive changes over time requires ongoing support, reinforcement through multiple contexts (family, school, peer groups), and addressing the systemic sociocultural factors that perpetuate narrow beauty ideals and appearance-based evaluation. This dissertation aims to serve as a foundation for future research and intervention development addressing the effects of media portrayals on body image across developmental stages—a pressing issue that warrants continued exploration and evidence-based action. The integration of theoretical analysis with participatory qualitative research provides a comprehensive understanding of this phenomenon from children's own perspectives and offers practical implications for educators, parents, policymakers, and mental health professionals working with young people in contemporary digital environments. By centering children's voices and lived experiences throughout the research process, this work contributes to a more nuanced, authentic understanding of how young people navigate appearance pressures in digital contexts. It demonstrates both the vulnerabilities that digital culture creates for developing children and the potential for thoughtfully designed educational interventions to empower children as critical consumers of media, appreciative inhabitants of their own bodies, and agents capable of resisting harmful appearance norms. Ultimately, the research underscores that promoting positive body image in the digital age requires not only individual-level education but also broader cultural transformation toward valuing diverse bodies, challenging restrictive beauty standards, and prioritizing human worth beyond physical appearance.