Just 8 Minutes on TikTok is Enough to Ruin Someone’s Body Image

The following is excerpted from an online article posted by StudyFinds.

A recent study found that 8-minutes of watching videos on TikTok, especially “pro-anorexia” and “fitspiration” videos, harmed females’ self-perception of their body image.

The research was led by Rachel Hogg, senior lecturer in psychology at Charles Stuart University in Australia.

Social media have only made body image issues worse for young people, leading them to compare themselves with others and strive for often unattainable – and unhealthy – beauty standards.

TikTok, which allows people to create and consume short videos, has amassed more than 1 billion users. Harmful content, including videos that glamorize disordered eating and extremely thin bodies, circulate readily on the platform.

Given most TikTok users are young, the study sought to explore how such content affects young women’s body image. The study found watching just eight minutes of TikTok content focused on dieting, weight loss and exercise had an immediate negative effect on body image satisfaction.

The study recruited 273 female-identifying TikTok users aged 18 to 28 and randomly allocated them into two groups. People with a past or current eating disorder diagnosis were excluded from the study.

Participants in the experimental group were shown a 7–8 minute compilation of “pro-anorexia” and “fitspiration” content taken directly from TikTok. These video clips featured young women restricting their food intake and giving workout advice and dieting tips, such as describing their juice cleanses for weight loss.

Participants in the control group watched a 7–8-minute compilation of TikTok videos featuring “neutral” content, such as videos of nature, cooking, and animals.

Using a series of questionnaires, the researchers measured levels of body image satisfaction and attitudes towards beauty standards before and after participants watched the TikTok content.

Both groups reported a decrease in body image satisfaction from before to after watching the videos. But those exposed to pro-anorexia content had the greatest decrease in body image satisfaction. They also experienced an increase in internalization of beauty standards.

The content shown to participants in the experimental group is widely circulated on TikTok, not just within “pro-ana” communities. “Clean” eating, detoxing and limited-ingredient diet trends are the wolf in lamb’s clothing of disordered eating, allowing diet culture to be rebranded as “wellness” and “self-care”. This content, alongside fitspiration, often rewards and gamifies excessive exercise and disordered eating.

In the study, 64% of participants reported seeing disordered eating content on their For You page. Examples could include videos portraying binge eating, laxative use or excessive exercise.

Source: StudyFinds
https://studyfinds.org/8-minutes-tiktok-body-image/