Researchers analyzed TikTok’s “For You” suggestions and discovered the page’s algorithm may be contributing to a significant issue for female users. It’s making some women dislike their own bodies.
Australian researchers surveyed 273 women between 18 and 28 years old from July-October 2021 on their use of the social media platform. The participants were shown “pro-anorexia” photos and monitored their responses. In as little as 10 minutes of scrolling, participants were negatively affected.
“‘Pro’ eating disorder communities, hereafter referred to as ‘pro-ana’ (pro-anorexia) communities, are a particular concern in a social media context,” according to the study. “These communities encourage disordered eating, normalize disordered behaviors, and provide a means of connection for individuals who endorse anti-recovery from eating disorders. Weight-loss tips, excessive exercise routines, and images of emaciated figures are routinely shared in these online communities, with extant research highlighting the association between viewing eating disorder content online and offline eating disorder behavior.”
It’s not just the existence of such content that poses a health risk, but also the vast quantity.
“Because disordered eating content is so prevalent on TikTok, there was also the possibility that TikTok users in our study would be somewhat inoculated (to) its effect but that certainly was not the case,” study co-author Rachel Hogg, senior lecturer in the School of Psychology at Australia’s Charles Sturt University, told NBC News in an email.
Researchers laid much of the blame at the feet of TikTok’s “For You” page algorithm for its susceptibility to promote damaging content.
“The algorithm on TikTok is much more influential than the choices of individual users in determining the content they see on their For You page,” Hogg said. The study revealed that around 64% of women reported being “exposed to disordered eating content” at some point on their “For You” page
.“One of the saddest realities to me is that the blunt nature of the algorithm is such that searching for body positivity content may result in users being exposed to pro-anorexia content,” she added. “A user seeking out anti-anorexia content to support their recovery from an eating disorder may be exposed to the exact opposite of what they were looking for — harmful dieting content.”
Hogg and co-author Madison Blackburn’s study was published earlier this month in PLOS ONE.
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