Abstract

Selfies, a social phenomenon that has recently gained popularity, have been gaining in popularity. Recent studies on "selfitis" (the obsession with snapping selfies) highlighted the potential for addiction, compulsiveness, and obsessive behavior in young people, sparking more scholarly discussion on the dangers of medicalizing everyday behaviors. The present study was carried out to determine selfie taking behavior among first year medical students. Materials and Methods: The study was an institutional cross sectional conducted among first year graduates. Selfitis Behaviour Scale, a six-component scale developed by Balakrishnan & Griffiths, was used to assess selfie-related behavior. Components of the scale are environmental enhancement, social competition, attention-seeking, mood modification, self-confidence, and social conformity. Each item has a different response on a 5-point Likert scale (1 –strongly disagree; 2 –disagree; 3 –neither agree nor disagree; 4 –agree; 5 –strongly agree). The total scores ranged from 20 to 100. The behavior was categorized as normal, borderline, acute, and chronic selfitis with scores ranging from 20 to 39, 40 to 59, 60 to 79, and 80 to 100, respectively. Results: A total of 111 students participated in the study. In the present study, the majority of the students (51.36%) were found to be under normal and scored between 20-39. This was followed by borderline selfitis 50 (45.04%). Two participants scored in the range of 60-79 and were found to have acute selfitis. No student in our study had chronic selfitis. A preponderance of female students was observed under borderline selfitis (n=37) Conclusion: The problem of selfie addiction among medical students has to be addressed. it's critical to spread knowledge about the hazards and potential repercussions of excessive selfie-taking.

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