A new study published in the journal Body Image sheds light on how social media images of peers, either sexualized or non-sexualized, affect young women’s views of themselves and others. The findings reveal that exposure to sexualized images leads to heightened self-objectification among viewers and a tendency to dehumanize the individuals depicted. Moreover, the act of generating hashtags for these images amplifies this effect, with tags often focusing unduly on body parts. Research has linked the exposure to sexually objectified representations in media with various negative psychological ou…