What a boom fueled by celebrities and social networks and what risks it poses

A teenage girl runs her finger across the screen of her cell phone. It’s on TikTok, where the videos play at hypnotic speed. He stops at one that shows a “before and after”: the round face of an influencer after a transition effect appears refined, with a removed double chin, prominent cheekbones and shiny and voluminous lips. It is not a temporary filter, but rather an aspirational model that repeats itself in a loop and that many young women try to recreate off-screen, in aesthetic medicine practices.

The fashion of “shaped faces” (marked jaws, upturned noses, long and symmetrical faces) found a privileged place in adolescence and early twenties. A phenomenon fueled by social networks and that has the stars of Argentine urban pop, such as Emilia Mernes or Nicki Nicole as references. There was speculation about aesthetic interventions carried out by both artists. And her younger followers want to look like her.

The phenomenon is growing at the pace of TikTok and Instagram, but also Offering increasingly accessible procedures. With this in mind, experts set a limit: beauty cannot be reduced to a syringe or a filter.

Many girls are increasingly in a hurry to accelerate their growing up process: they act on this desire, have to undergo several procedures and look older than they actually are. “Youth is a stage characterized by insecurities and crises in self-esteem. Early access to social networks and selfie culture reinforce these characteristics,” explains Fernanda Cohen, an aesthetic doctor.

Young people function for them “Brand” logic: If something is fashionable, it is a guarantee of social acceptance. “In this context, they may want to look like their idol and have a fantasy that a certain physical characteristic is associated with success. It is a magical thought that we as professionals must know how to recognize,” he warns.

The fascination is not just limited to the music. In a world that is permeated Algorithm logicExamples of “perfection” proliferate. Plastic surgeon Fernando Felice translates it into consumer language: “Teens believe that everything they see online is real. They suffer from FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) syndrome, the fear of being left out, and therefore strive to be the face of singers and influencers. They want to look like these characters and will do anything to achieve this.“And beware: “An excess of product can make a 20-year-old girl look 35.”

Full lips come first, followed by a pronounced jawline, nose and chin. Hyaluronic acid became the star of the office. “It is a noble product when used well and in the right dosage. The problem is the excess: it creates deformed faces and.” even irreversible complications“, warns Felice. These include granulomas, permanent inflammation, tissue necrosis and, in extreme cases, even blindness.

Cohen agrees that access to quick and non-invasive techniques is making it easier for younger and younger girls to enter the practice. But be warned: “A cosmetic procedure is not like a visit to the hairdresser. Every intervention leaves lasting aesthetic marks.

For psychoanalyst Hilda Catz, member of the Argentine Psychoanalytic Association, the growing tendency of young people to change their facial features to resemble pop idols cannot be viewed in isolation from the digital ecosystem in which they grow up. His view makes the phenomenon more complex: It’s not just about aesthetics, but also about identity, vulnerability and a culture that pushes young people towards uniform models of beauty while weakening the bonds that should sustain them.

Catz suggests that hyperconnectivity, mediated by technological advances that provide immediate visual pleasures, accelerates the expulsion of the different, replacing it with “an imaginary mirror image” in which the possibility of finding oneself in the other’s gaze is diluted. In this scenario, digital consumption does not control the toxicity of the spaces it promotes and leaves to children and young people. They are exposed to pressure to conform their bodies to artificial models. This uniformity, he warns, pushes for ever earlier surgeries and body modifications as part of a culture that offers quick answers to identity gaps.

According to their approach, the problem begins not with the injection, but with the fragility of the founding relationships. According to the psychoanalyst, when parental functions decline, adolescents try to compensate for this deficiency by looking for replacement models, which can appear in different forms: from sectarian groups to new digital “tribalizations” led by figures who act as pseudo-authorities. There, the illusion of protection is created against what Catz calls “adulticide,” a culture that withdraws support from adults and abandons young people to a false sense of limitless freedom in which “just do it” and an empty pleasure that dissolves desire prevails.

The risk, he warns, is to be trapped in the “perverse culture of consumption,” in which the screen invites consumption that consumes, and does not return a gaze that grants existence. That is why it emphasizes the importance of preventive work in the early stages of life, supporting families and rebuilding bonds that enable real encounters. It’s not about judging, he makes clear, but about creating spaces of intimacy in the face of a world that encourages intimidation.

In this context Aesthetic procedures to “shape” a face are not a simple fashion gesture: For Catz, they are the visible symptom of a broader scenario in which young people’s subjectivity is at risk, caught between emotional voids, uniform aesthetics and a digital environment that offers quick answers to questions that require time, connections and support.

“Facial harmonization” is the buzzword. It is a combination of botulinum toxin, dermal fillers, biostimulators, tension threads and peels that are intended to balance the face. “The goal is not to change the face, but to enhance natural beauty and restore proportion and freshness,” explains Cohen. However, he emphasizes this assessment should be stricter for adolescents: Maturity, reflection and a period of waiting are required to confirm that the desire is not temporary.

Happy sum a practical criterion: Not everything that circulates on networks is necessary. “The fact that a patient consults does not mean that the procedure must be carried out. The most professional thing is often to say no and explain why,” he emphasizes.

One of the most common scenes in clinics is that of a young woman arriving with the photo of her reference. “I think it’s good that they’re bringing her,” says Felice. “But then I show them the mirror and we work on their own face. We cannot erase one person’s identity to copy another’s. “We all have maximum beauty potential and the key is to achieve it without losing naturalness,” he emphasizes.

Cohen agrees, adding that in many cases it depends the connection between beauty and success. “The risk is to believe that if you have a certain cheekbone or a certain nose you can have access to the same life as these characters,” he says. For this reason, both doctors and psychologists emphasize the importance of a comprehensive diagnosis that takes into account the patient’s emotional and social state.

The video was already playing on the screen. The teenager scrolls again. Another “before and after” awaits you in the algorithm.