Abstract
BackgroundGlobally, there has been an exponential rise in smartphone use and selfie taking among youth. To make selfies exciting, dangerous selfies are often taken that may lead to catastrophic consequences, including death. This study aims to estimate the prevalence of dangerous selfies and to determine the factors associated with dangerous selfies among medical and nursing students in India.MethodsThe study was conducted at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Bhubaneswar, India, in April–August 2018. The inclusion criteria were students enrolled in the Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) and nursing courses of AIIMS, Bhubaneswar. Students who did not use smartphones were excluded from the study. The interview schedule and Selfitis Behaviour Scale (SBS) were used to collect information on sociodemographic variables, smartphone use and variables related to selfies and dangerous selfies. Forward stepwise logistic regression was undertaken with the probability of entry and removal as 0.05 and 0.10, respectively.ResultsOf 633 eligible participants, 595 were included in the study. The mean (SD) age of the participants was 21.2 (1.6) years. More than half (56.8%) of the participants were female, 384 (64.5%) were medical students and 211 (35.5%) were nursing students. Nearly two-thirds of the participants (70.6%) preferred to take selfie. One hundred thirty three (40.3%) of the participants posted selfies on social media daily. The prevalence of dangerous selfies was 8.74% (95% CI: 6.73–11.28). Eight injury episodes while taking selfies were reported by seven (1.2%) participants. Being male (AOR 4.96, 95% CI 2.53–9.74), posting selfies on social media daily (AOR 3.33, 95% CI 1.71–6.47) and an SBS score > 75 (AOR 4.97, 95% CI 1.43–17.28) were independent predictors of dangerous selfies.ConclusionNearly one in ten medical and nursing students reported having taken a dangerous selfie, and one in one hundred reported having been injured while attempting to take a selfie. Being male, posting selfies on social media daily and an SBS score > 75 were independent predictors of dangerous selfies. Further research is required to identify the community burden of dangerous selfies and to develop strategies to prevent selfie-related fatalities among youths.
Highlights
There has been an exponential rise in smartphone use and selfie taking among youth
This study aims to estimate the prevalence of dangerous selfies and to determine the factors associated with dangerous selfies among medical and nursing students in India
Of 633 eligible participants, 595 students participated in the study, and the response rate was 94%
Summary
There has been an exponential rise in smartphone use and selfie taking among youth. The present age can undoubtedly be branded as the era of advancements in mobile technologies. There are approximately 2.5 billion smartphone users worldwide and 650 million users in India [1]. In the last three decades, advancements in mobile technology have led to new features, such as the selfietool, online gaming, gambling, and shopping [2]. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a “selfie” as a photograph that one has taken of oneself, generally with a smartphone or a web camera, that is often uploaded to a social media platform [3]. The word selfie has become so common that the Oxford English Dictionary declared it “the Word of the Year” in 2013 [4]. According to a study by Lee and Sung (2016), smartphone users take approximately 93 million selfies each day [5]
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