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The Science of Social Comparison: Why Scrolling Leaves You Feeling Smaller

4 the researchers behind it — "Everyone else seems to have it figured out" isn't a character flaw — it's a prediction your brain makes after running the comparison algorithm Leon F

University of Minnesota

Leon Festinger

Known for:Founding social comparison theory (1954): people evaluate themselves by comparing with others when objective standards are absent.

Key findings

  1. 1954

    Humans have a drive to evaluate their opinions and abilities; when objective, non-social means are unavailable, they evaluate by comparison with other people. ↗

  2. 1954

    Comparison gravitates toward similar others: the closer someone is to us in ability or situation, the more their standing shapes our self-evaluation — which is why peers' feeds hit harder than celebrities'. ↗

Albert Einstein College of Medicine

Thomas Ashby Wills

Known for:Downward comparison theory (1981): under threat, comparing with worse-off others can restore subjective well-being — comparison direction, not comparison itself, decides the emotional outcome.

Key findings

  1. 1981

    People experiencing negative affect can enhance subjective well-being through comparison with a less fortunate other, on a passive or an active basis. ↗

  2. 1981

    Downward comparison operates across many domains — from affiliation under fear to prejudice and humor — showing self-evaluation motives quietly steer whom we compare against. ↗

University of Georgia

Abraham Tesser

Known for:The Self-Evaluation Maintenance (SEM) model — showing how closeness to a high performer shifts between threatening and flattering self-evaluation depending on domain relevance

Key findings

  1. 1988

    Close others who outperform you in a self-relevant domain threaten self-evaluation (contrast effect), while the same outperformance in an irrelevant domain allows you to bask in their glory (assimilation effect) — meaning the domain matters as much as the direction of comparison. ↗

University of Toledo

Nicole Vogel

Known for:Experimental research on how passive exposure to idealized Facebook profiles lowers self-evaluations, and how heavier platform use amplifies social comparison behavior

Key findings

  1. 2014

    Passive exposure to Facebook profiles depicting others with superior attractiveness, intelligence, and success lowered participants' self-evaluations on those same dimensions; heavier Facebook users reported more comparison behavior, suggesting platform use and upward comparison form a reinforcing cycle. ↗

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