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Are you the type of person who always changes your profile picture when you have a new set of photos, or are you more likely to stick to the same one for a while? Personally, I fall into the second group. I can’t remember the last time I changed my profile picture. It’s probably time for an update, honestly.

Some of us, like me, hardly ever change our profile picture. After all, once you’ve got a good one, there’s no need to, right? But some people change theirs constantly, always trying to keep people on their toes and make sure they stand out in an ever-expanding pool of social media users. If you’re someone who changes your profile picture a lot, it says some pretty fascinating things about you psychologically.

According to psychology, regularly changing your profile picture reveals something about your personality.

Heem, known as @heemmentality on TikTok, shares philosophical and psychological insight on common subjects. In one post, he addressed changing your profile picture often. In his professional opinion, doing so is a sign that you are “mentally unstable.”

“Psychologically, a stable identity doesn’t need constant approval or reinvention,” he explained. “Changing your profile picture frequently often points to a deep-seated identity diffusion. They are trying on different personas, hoping one fits, and constantly needing reassurance for their own self-perception.”

He connected this to one of the “big five” personality traits. “It’s highly cor with neuroticism, insecurity, and a fluctuating self-concept,” he continued. “It’s a digital manifestation of searching for who you are, or, more accurately, searching for who you want others to think you are. If they are constantly changing their digital face, it’s likely that their internal self-image is fragmented and volatile.”

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The profile pictures of neurotic individuals seem to share certain characteristics.

A study published by the University of Pennsylvania examined different users’ Twitter (now known as X) profile pictures to determine which of the big five personality traits various profile pictures could be categorized as. For profile pictures classified as neurotic, researchers said, “Notably, photos of neurotic people are perhaps unsurprisingly anticor with colorfulness … In terms of composition, neurotic people display simpler images and do not respect the rule of thirds.”

Of course, having those characteristics doesn’t necessarily mean that someone changes their profile picture a lot. A neurotic person could choose a simple image lacking in color and not change it for years. It is an interesting insight into what neurotic individuals might lean towards when picking profile pictures, though, since Heem believes they are so much more likely to change them.

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Another psychologist agreed with Heem.

A psychologist and life coach named Francesca backed up what Heem said in her own TikTok video. “Constantly changing their profile picture can symbolize that the person doesn’t have a strong identity and is pretty insecure,” she said.

Yan Krukau | Pexels

If you’re someone who changes your profile picture a lot, you might be starting to feel a little concerned based on these descriptions. But frequently updating your profile picture doesn’t have to be a bad thing, just like neuroticism isn’t necessarily a bad thing, although it is often portrayed that way.

According to Psychology Today, “High neuroticism ratings are associated with risk of mental illness and worse outcomes, on average, on measures of health and relationship satisfaction. However, it can be argued that neuroticism exists because it provided advantages (such as sensitivity to threats) over the course of humanity’s evolution.”

The outlet also noted that neuroticism is a spectrum. So, everyone has some level of neuroticism in them. Having a higher level doesn’t mean something is wrong with you. It just tells you what kind of strengths and weaknesses you possess, like any personality trait would.

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Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.