Understanding photo investment in adolescence and emerging adulthood: an examination of body-esteem, self-esteem and sex

Literature emphasizes the association between highly visual social networks and body image concerns in adolescents and emerging adults. Photo Investment (PI) was recently conceptualized to better describe the individual's emotional concerns and efforts employed in self-photo posting. However, literature evidence is still limited. This study aims to investigate the role of body-esteem in terms of appearance (i.e. general feelings about one's physical appearance), attribution (i.e. one's perception of other's evaluation about one's appearance) and weight satisfaction, self-esteem and sex on PI for adolescents and emerging adults, as two important stages of life for physical development. Participants were 262 adolescents and 242 emerging adults who completed an online survey. We tested a path-analysis model where the listed variables explained PI, and we performed a multigroup analysis to investigate the structure invariance. Results showed that the model is not invariant for age, thus resulting in two different path-analysis models. Findings showed that: 1) for adolescents, PI was explained by appearance and sex (i.e. being female); 2) for emerging adults, PI was explained by appearance, attribution and sex (i.e. being female). No significant findings emerged for self-esteem. Findings provide cues to understand PI and to design interventions for both adolescents and emerging adults.