Does a Lack of Transparency Lead to the Dark Side of Social Media? a Study in South Western Europe According to Gender and Age

Social media's globalization has had an impact on young people by exposing them to unachievable beauty standards and an abundance of meticulously edited images and seemingly perfect bodies. Does a lack of transparency lead to the dark side of social media? The purpose of this study is to shed light on the ways in which social media has impacted young people and the harmful tactics that these platforms use to manipulate people's body image. To obtain data for this study, a survey with 151 responses was conducted. The data was then analyzed using the chi-square test of independence as well as Fisher’s Exact Test (as the prerequisites of the chi-square test were not satisfied) by using the IBM SPSS Statistics software package. We can conclude that age and gender are not independent of experiencing different levels of pressure (women are more affected, as are younger people up to 25 years old) to maintain a perfect body through interacting on social media. More transparency is hence needed so that our youths are not led down the wrong path.