Snapping a selfie while on holiday abroad has become a part of travelling for many, but for some, turning the camera to take the perfect smiling shot is the ultimate ick.
A new study has revealed that taking selfies on a trip or at a special celebration can actually make tourists not want to visit the destination, according to Research Gate.
For instance, when others are looking up places for their wedding, or planning their next getaway, they are more likely to get turned off if they see a picture of someone else there, the study found.
Researchers concluded that the reason individuals find destinations less appealing when selfies are involved is because it makes the viewers feel like the person in the photo is signaling ownership to the place.
The lead author of the research paper, and assistant professor of marketing at Tulane University, Zoe Y. Lu said: ‘We want to stand out by being a little different.’
Taking selfies on a trip or at a special celebration can actually make people not want to visit the destination, according to a recent study by Research Gate
‘If my cousin saw a picture of my husband proposing to me at a particular national park, for example, my cousin would worry that choosing that same spot to propose to his loved one would be perceived as him being a boring person, lacking a sense of self,’ she added.
The report detailed six separate studies – including a deep dive into more than 14,000 posts from a top influencer and five ‘controlled experiments’ – that all found that taking selfies can ‘lower viewers liking and preference for the venue.’
In one of the experiments, Lu and her team asked 416 participants to look at hiking trail A and trail B, all while picturing they were trying to choose a spot for their New Year’s Day hike.
They were more attracted to trail A than trail B because it was just a stand alone image of the trail, without others in it.
‘Our theory is that the hiker in the image offers kind of a territorial signal,’ Lu said.
Researchers concluded that the reason others find destinations less appealing when selfies are involved is because it makes the viewers feel like the person in the photo is signaling ownership to the place
‘It says to our self-identity, “Someone else has been here, don’t try their hike, try a hike that seems like nobody has done.”‘
During another experiment, Lu and her team found that the rules didn’t apply when the situation wasn’t as personal.
Participants were told to imagine they were someone’s wedding planner trying to pick the perfect venue.
In this instance, the participants didn’t mind if another couple was seen in a picture or not.
‘Wedding planners aren’t seeking self-identity the way their clients are,’ Lu said.
But, in another experiment when they were told to choose wedding venues for themselves, everything changed.
In this, 53 percent of participants chose location A because the pictures did not have another couple getting married. But, if there was a couple seen getting hitched in the image, and not in location B, just 27 percent of participants chose the first option.
During another experiment, Lu and her team found that the rules didn’t apply when the situation wasn’t as personal
Though the study might make some think twice before snapping a picture, Lu said it could also impact online marketers.
‘They might encourage previous customers not to post selfies of special experiences if they want new customers to try those experiences at the same location, which seems counterintuitive, I know,’ she said.
Now, even hotels and popular tourist destinations might consider switching it up to try and entice more customers to book trips with them.
At the same time, influencers might want to be considerate when posing places so they don’t make it seem territorial.
Lu added that one exception could be if the person in the image actually owns the place, but they would need to ‘acknowledge’ that.
