Online beauty ideals are most harmful to young women who strive for unhealthy body shapes, writes Deutsche Welle.

For many young people on social media platforms like Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok, it’s hard to escape the beauty ideals and standards circulating online, and these trends can be dangerous. Currently, what's "in vogue" are a thin waist, round buttocks and slim legs.

Ten years ago, the "thigh gap" was trendy. This is a gap between the inner thighs that remains visible when women stand with their legs touching. Its promoters claim anyone can achieve this look with enough diet and exercise.

While for most women of normal body weight it is considered dangerous to aspire to have a thigh gap, not everyone seems to be aware of this.

"Is a thigh gap healthy?" and "How to quickly get a thigh gap?" are just two of the questions that come up in a quick Google search. There are numerous challenges promoting a "tiny", "slim" and "super-thin" waist. One involves ensuring your waist is so narrow that another person can comfortably wrap their arm around it and drink from a water bottle.

"What I eat in a day" videos have also become popular, often featuring young people, usually women, detailing what they claim is their regular daily diet—mostly low-carb and sugar-free.

On the other hand, "body positivity" is another trend, with its supporters saying people should accept their bodies as they are. But it is unlikely that social media users will come across such content unless they actively search for it, as social media algorithms are guided by users' search results and established viewing preferences.

Researchers say they have rarely seen such a significant positive change in such a short time

Research has consistently shown that social media can impact users' self-esteem. A recent study by York University in Toronto, Canada, explored the effects of a short-term break from social media.

It found that the self-esteem and body image perceptions of women who stopped using social media for just one week improved significantly.

Researchers divided 66 young women into two groups, one of which continued to use social media as usual, while the other was required to abstain completely. They were all asked beforehand how they felt about their bodies and whether they wished to look like the models on social media.

When the same questions were asked a week later, the self-perceived body images of those who abstained from social media had improved, particularly among those most susceptible to internalizing thin beauty ideals.

The study's authors say it is rare to see such a significant effect in this area of psychological research. They added that the improvements might not only be due to the break from social media, but also because participants likely replaced social media consumption with healthier behaviors, such as spending time with friends, engaging in sports or being outdoors.

Regulation attempts have had limited impact

Overall, people find it hard to detach from social media, especially younger generations. Indeed, the average time people spend on social media platforms has increased over the years.

In January, Meta, the tech giant operating Facebook and Instagram, announced it would hide "age-inappropriate" content from young users' accounts, provided they do not lie about their age.

So far, however, regulatory attempts have met with limited success and poor compliance from tech companies required to implement them. For example, the EU's Digital Services Act, partly designed to protect minors, requires network operators to delete or hide particularly problematic content, such as glorifying eating disorders.

But a report by the nonprofit global initiative Reset found that less than 30% of harmful content was removed when required. It was even found that the social media platform TikTok tended to remove even less than that. Earlier this year, however, it did remove the "legginglegs" hashtag.