Abstract

Gender is such an important identity that children are taught from a young age how to present themselves according to their gender. Social media has provided a new way to present identity and the self to others, and while this has been looked at in previous studies, the feedback that different presentation receive hasn’t been as studied. In this study, I looked at 214 of the top Instagram posts and the first 5 comments under each post to see how people present gender and how users respond to this presentation within different Instagram communities while taking into account the intersection of other identities like race and ethnicity in the presentation of gender online. I found that overall people conformed to traditional gender roles, though white people tended to conform more to traditional gender presentation. I also found that non-sponsored posts adhered to the idea of masculine and feminine spheres more than sponsored posts and posts from company accounts. Additionally, I found that number of comments gave more significant information about engagement with popular posts than number of likes did, suggesting that ways of measuring engagement might need to be examined. In many ways, Instagram has become another way of upholding, performing, and enforcing traditional gender roles.

Advisor

Clayton, Susan

Department

Psychology

Disciplines

Social Psychology | Women's Studies

Keywords

Instagram, gender presentation, gender roles, social media

Publication Date

2021

Degree Granted

Bachelor of Arts

Document Type

Senior Independent Study Thesis

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© Copyright 2021 Katherine G. O'Doherty