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Purpose: As biomedicine grants technology and quantification privileged roles in our cultural constructions of health, media and technology play an increasingly important role in mediating our everyday experiences of our bodies and may contribute to the reproduction of gendered norms.

Design: This study draws from a broad variety of disciplines to contextualize and interpret contemporary trends in self-quantification, focusing on metrics for health and fitness. I will also draw from psychology and feminist scholarship on objectification and body-surveillance.

Findings: I interpret body-tracking tools as biomedical technologies of self-surveillance that facilitate and encourage control of human bodies, while solidifying demands for standardization around neoliberal values of enhancement and optimization. I also argue that body-tracking devices reinforce and normalize the scrutiny of human bodies in ways that may reproduce and advance longstanding gender disparities in detriment of women.

Implications: A responsible conceptualization, design, implementation, and usage of health-tracking technologies requires us to recognize and better understand how technologies with widely touted benefits also have the potential to reinforce and extend inequalities, alter subjective experiences and produce damaging outcomes, especially among certain groups. I conclude by proposing some alternatives for devising technologies or encouraging practices that are sensitive to these differences and acknowledge the validity of alternative values.

Introduction: As a type of poverty, relative poverty can be defined as being below the average welfare of society. Basic needs can be afforded, but individuals can’t take advantage of the welfare created by society. Today coding the reflection of welfare, sharing experiences has new meanings by new social media means. Instagram is especially preferred in visual sharing because of its filter options, live feed, or story mode. These features help the message sender to increase the effect of the message and the receiver to understand the reality with its different dimensions. It is not shocking that the images of welfare and its indicators are shared increasingly in social networks because storytelling in this media is fed. The visual strengthening is underlining the possession of the owner and the deficiency of the non-owner from their perspectives.

Purpose: This study examines the emotional effects of ideal life images shared on Instagram on other individuals. The aim is to reveal and define the meaning ascribed to such fractions of life with a visual appeal by people who cannot lead this kind of life.

Methodology: In accordance with the Social Learning Theory, the study assumes that people with relative poverty take notice of their own poverty through social media. The study investigates the emotions manifested by individuals who take notice of the things that they lack through social media. Thus, a qualitative study was designed and conducted using a phenomenological approach. The phenomenon of this study is failing to have. The objective of the study is to understand and determine what the individuals who do social comparisons feel they lack. For this purpose, the fundamental research questions of this study are as follows: RQ1: What are the main categories of Instagram posts that evoke a sense of deprivation in individuals?; RQ2: What do glamorous Instagram posts mean to individuals who are above the relative poverty threshold? The data gathered via the in-depth interview technique were analyzed using the computer-assisted qualitative analysis program (MaxqDa 2020). Qualitative content analysis and descriptive analysis were the forms of analysis used in the study.

Findings: The fact that there are negative links between passively consuming information on social media and well-being is supported by previous studies. This study exposes the experiences of “failing to have” due to upward social comparison in individuals who are above the relative poverty threshold in Turkey. The categories of shared content that evoke the feeling of deficiency in the participants are as follows: Travel/vacation, participation in social life, physical attractiveness, material possessions, and professional/academic career. The participants of the study are individuals who are above the relative poverty threshold for Turkey. The participants want to have “more than what they already have.” For this reason, it can be suggested that the main keyword summarizing the findings of the study is “more.” The study demonstrates that failing to travel and participate in social life deeply affects the participants and causes them to experience negative emotions.

This chapter examines the surgical body modification experiences of transgender and cisgender people in the United States. It analyzes how surgery consumers with different gendered histories pursue “enhanced” embodiment. Both cisgender and transgender people obtain similar surgeries, but their procedures are differently regulated. Based on 40 in-depth interviews, this chapter compares the presurgical and postsurgical experiences of transgender and cisgender people. The findings show that cisgender and transgender people felt similarly about their bodies before surgery and reported corresponding cosmetic and psychological motivations for surgery. Both groups also had comparable postsurgical outcomes and used surgery to actualize a more desirable gendered embodiment. Ultimately, surgery resulted in changed gendered embodiment that enhanced the self for both groups. It could be psychologically transformative for cisgender people and provide more of a cosmetic effect for transgender people. These findings complicate disparate regulations of transgender and cisgender surgeries. They highlight surgeries as body technologies that enhance gendered embodiment allowing both cisgender and transgender consumers to articulate gendered concepts of the self.

This chapter presents an auto-ethnographic journey into the world of women's bodybuilding and the role performance-enhancing drugs play in the pursuit of muscularity in this growing, but hard-to-reach, subculture. The research addresses a paucity in the literature and paves the way for further research to inform public health initiatives for this population. Synthesizing journal entries, field observations and informal conversations recorded over the course of 18 months, this chapter provides insight into the rituals and practices present in bodybuilding culture. This embodied narrative explores the decision-making process surrounding anabolic androgenic steroid use in the context of competitive endeavour, including the impact that cultural norms, peer influence and personal narrative have on their uptake. It also sheds light on the experiences of being a woman in a man's world and the additional stigma women face when attempting to increase their muscularity. It also highlights the personal and professional challenges involved in auto-ethnographic endeavour.