That applies to... 100% of all marketing. Not just the cosmetics industry.
Selling 5 cents' worth of scented lanolin for $20, which no one can tell you used, is not even the sort of "price-signaling" that usually motivates absurd overpayment. That it succeeds indicates deep pathology.
A less publicized example of this is what's done in music production. Most people aren't singers, so it's not as obvious, but the perfection you hear in any track produced in the last 20 years sets pretty unrealistic ideals for even a trained voice.
Unlike the magazine example, there isn't a compelling ulterior motive. They just wanted to sell more CDs.
https://www.menshealth.com/fitness/
I am skeptical about this. I'm co-owner of a gym and I don't think the people there--men or women--who care a lot about how they look, are depressed or insecure at all when they see Instagram photos. And many of them spend a lot of time building an Instagram brand.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
― Upton Sinclair
They actively seek to make women insecure about their appearance, and collect advertising from outfits that promise to correct it.
One of the promoted tropes is that overspending on a putative remedy is giving yourself a treat, rather than giving the vendor a treat.