What started out as a simple picture on your phone has turned into 10.

The first one was probably cringe-worthy. The second, with a tight-lipped smile, was slightly better. Then suddenly you’re stuck with a hundred shots of your face, each one slightly varied as a result of your search for your best angle.

Of course, the next step is choosing one worthy of the Internet, posting it on your favorite social media site and captioning it with a hashtag: “#Selfie.”

As communication technology continues to flourish, our obsession with image is at an all-time high. It’s easy to cite vanity and narcissism as the primary motives for this trend, but image obsession is revelatory of a deeper, more significant mindset that has developed in our society.

On the rise

If a picture paints a thousand words, then the 45 million pictures uploaded on Instagram—per day!—must all be clamoring for attention. The sheer number of social media sites like Facebook and Vine that have been cropping up these days has only expedited the sharing of images and video.

Sharing photos is indubitably in vogue, and perhaps the most pervasive photo of all is the selfie. There are several variations of this: The GPOY (gratuitous picture of yourself), the I’m-tired-I-look-horrible-check-it-out shot and the classic, pursed-lipped “duckface” are just a sampling of a whole range. One thing never changes, however: The camera’s lens always faces the photographer.

“Visual images are carriers of content,” says Jenna Atun, an instructor at the Communication Department. “[The pictures we post can carry] a message of social status… or sometimes of confidence. Some people say it’s self-expression.”

This obsession with image and the message they send is everywhere—even filmmakers and songwriters are commenting on it through their work. The latest string of heist films such as Louis Leterrier’s Now You See Me and Sofia Coppola’s The Bling Ring, for example, are all about the glitz and glamour of being a celebrity.

One of the biggest films that came out before the latest string of heist-movies was none other than Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby. Adapted from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s book written in 1925, it chronicles the decadence of the roaring ‘20s, a time of wealth and excess before the sudden, cutting reality of the Great Depression.

There are no elaborate heists, no breaking into locked vaults or fake hold-ups here. What we have is the same glittering opulence and debauchery also present in the other movies mentioned. Fitzgerald’s book may have been written almost a century ago, but it still resonates with the modern world.

Another example of our image obsession is a song that rose to popularity in 2012: Psy’s “Gangnam Style.” To the surprise of most, the viral song isn’t just about sexy ladies or a guy hopping up and down, wriggling his fists.

An article by Max Fisher for The Atlantic critiques Seoul, South Korea for its culture of desiring lifestyles of celebrity, wealth and image. The music video—with images like Psy being fanned by a promiscuous woman in a playground—reveals the artificiality of such a life and, ultimately, condemns it.

#nofilter

The easy answers as to why image obsession is so prevalent are the dizzying advancements in technology and the recent explosion of the number of social media sites. “It’s so easy [to share an image],” says Atun. “With a click of a button, you can actually propagate and spread these images.”

Communication technology management junior Catherine Villarosa couldn’t agree more. “Technology’s embedded in our lifestyle, so this is the communication culture we have,” she explains.

But more than easy sharing, the Internet gives us something we, as a society, have come to value: Control.

We can, for instance, choose which photos to share and which ones to keep to ourselves. We save the shot with the perfect, winning smile and we might post an awkward face just for laughs, but all those pictures that caught us mid-blink are sent to the trash.

“Image obsession is more rampant now because we have the tools,” says Atun. Platforms such as the popular photo-sharing app, Instagram, aid us in our image-centered endeavors, but these tools go beyond more than just the sites themselves. Also at our disposal are a multitude of filters, frames and other photographic effects that give us the ability to manipulate original photos.

As pictures can be deceiving, so can videos. In a video entitled “How to Vlog: From the Vlogbrothers,”  YouTube user Hank Green talks about his filming process. He explains that there are a lot of stumbled words, mistakes and dead air that he edits out, culminating in a fun video in which he appears witty and eloquent.

However, Atun clarifies that she doesn’t subscribe to the idea that technology is the outright cause of our sudden interest in the perception of others. “Image obsession and selfies have always been there,” she observes.

The self-portrait is the much older relative of what many now refer to as “vain pics.” This actually dates back to the time of the Ancient Egyptians, when members of the elite, especially ruling pharaohs, commissioned sculptors to create statues in their likeness. Then the invention of the mirror in the 15th century saw artists taking reflection as an opportunity to study their own image, which they then brought to life through paint and canvas.

Today, those concepts still abound—it’s just that images of the self have become more accessible with the smartphone and its dual camera.

Don’t blame Narcissus

We have a means of control over how the public perceives us, which may explain our current fascination with image, but is image obsession just about control and narcissism?

“Narcissism has many aspects,” says Mary Lantin, a graduate assistant at the Department of Psychology. She cites lack of empathy, arrogance and a sense of entitlement, among the other characteristics of narcissism. “Wanting to post pictures of yourself on Facebook… is not [indicative of having a] narcissistic personality disorder per se,” she says in a mix of English and Filipino.

In fact, Lourdes Galvez-Tan, a part-time faculty member of the Department of Psychology, says that it may not be indicative of anything wrong at all. It’s a normal, human need to make a connection with someone, and selfies on social media sites are the medium we’ve found to make that connection.

Galvez-Tan explains that sharing photos online can also give one a sense of validation. “When people comment and they like your photos, you feel good about it and it can increase your self-esteem.”

Our self-image is shaped by what we choose to share, and “likes” and comments feed our insatiable need to be accepted as how we choose to portray ourselves. As Instagram’s “popular” page shows, being socially accepted means letting people know that we eat fancy food, drive expensive cars and have a great clothes—but we may not necessarily have all of these off-camera.

Andrea Guevarra, an economics-honors sophomore, discusses how this trend manifests a deeper affliction. “People nowadays struggle to look for worth and value and this may be one way to boost one’s self-esteem,” she says. “While others would say that it shows how self-obsessed we are, I would say it shows how obsessed we are with the opinions of others.”

There are many different facets to the current self-image craze and its origins, but its effect on society and the ways we’ve used it to our advantage have an even greater number of interpretations.

Selfie-esteem

Technology and its social platforms have allowed us to project an image to the world, one that plays a pivotal role in the scrutiny of our personal identity. But ultimately, it is important to recognize that the image we project does not necessarily determine who we are.

The hundreds of pictures in your phone are as much a part of you as the one deemed worthy of the Internet. “[Find] balance,” says Galvez Tan. “It’s great to connect with people, but that shouldn’t define your life.”