New York, Oct 20 (IANS): If you cannot take your eyes off the innumerable selfies posted on social networking sites like Facebook, take heed.

Researchers have found that the more often people view their own and others' selfies, the lower is their level of self-esteem and life satisfaction.

"Most of the research done on social network sites looks at the motivation for posting and liking content, but we're now starting to look at the effect of viewing behaviour," said Ruoxu Wang, one of the researchers from Pennsylvania State University in the US.

Viewing behaviour is also called "lurking" -- when a person does not participate in posting or liking social content, but is just an observer. 

This form of participation in social media may sound like it should have little effect on how humans view themselves, but the study, published online in the Journal of Telematics and Informatics, revealed the exact opposite.

The researches conducted an online survey to collect data on the psychological effects of posting and viewing selfies and groupies. 

They discovered that frequent viewing of selfies through social network sites like Facebook is linked to a decrease in self-esteem and life satisfaction.