Idealistic content on TikTok may be harmful to mental health and body image

Young women's thoughts and feelings about their bodies may be negatively impacted by TikTok videos that portray unrealistic physical attributes; the effects may be even more severe if the content is viewed as authentic and unedited.

Recent research in the Journal Body Image suggests that even a small amount of exposure to appearance-ideal content, or short social media videos that portray unattainable appearance standards, can have a negative effect on body image.

Our culture has certain expectations for how we should look, and these are known as appearance ideals. With few exceptions, this is a limited view of what constitutes attractiveness, such as having long legs, a toned stomach, big eyes, full lips, and clear skin.

Social media is a place where users typically view and present the most attractive versions of themselves and other people, even though these standards are not necessarily new. TikTok, which only makes use of short-form video content, can be a particularly appearance-focused space, with many popular viral trends like dance challenges reflecting ingrained ideas about what is beautiful.

"Appearance-ideal content can pressure women to look a certain way that is unrealistic or completely unattainable," says Dr. Jasmine Fardouly, senior author of the study from the School of Psychology at UNSW Science. We are aware that this problem arises at a young age because girls as young as six report feeling unhappy with their bodies, wanting to look thinner, and even trying diets to lose weight.

Young women frequently express dissatisfaction with their appearance, which is linked to poor mental health outcomes, such as depression, and some clinical eating disorders.

"These appearance ideals are not only promoted on social media, but there is a lot more opportunity to internalise them through the platforms," Dr. Fardouly claims.

Negative impacts on body image

For the study, the researchers showed 211 women aged 17 to 28 ten images or videos selected from the Instagram and TikTok accounts of young female social media influencers that reflected societal appearance ideals. They then surveyed the participants on several body image measures, using appearance-neutral content – content without people – for comparison.

The research also found participants made the same amount of upward appearance comparisons when they viewed ideal content in images or video. In other words, they compared their own bodies to the women in the appearance-ideal content, judging themselves as less attractive, negatively impacting their mood and increasing body dissatisfaction.

“The total exposure time was only like a minute and a half, and we found that was enough to have harmful impacts,” says Dr Fardouly. “That was just in a lab-based setting, so it’ll be interesting to measure the impact of exposure over the long-term and whether that has some cumulative effect.”

Emergence of editing and enhancements

Appearance ideals promoted through social media are often enhanced and edited using manipulation techniques like hyper-realistic face and body filters that are becoming harder to detect, particularly with video.

While the exact nature of any enhancements applied to the content in the study was unknown, participants perceived the video content they viewed to be less edited and enhanced than the images and were less satisfied with their own appearance by comparison.

On average, study participants reported spending between two to three hours on social media each day. The researchers say reducing daily screen time or diversifying the type of content we consume may help minimise overall exposure to appearance-ideal content.

“There’s also a role for the platforms, which can have very pervasive algorithms that promote appearance ideals and keep users engaged, to help expand the range of content shown to users in their social media feeds,” Ms Gurtala says.

Further research is also needed to determine if there are potential positive effects of viewing short-form video content featuring diverse and unedited containing unedited bodies.

“Some evidence suggests image-based content that challenges these beauty ideals and promotes body positivity, body function, and body acceptance help to make social media a less harmful environment for body image,” Dr Fardouly says.

In the meantime, the findings can inform media literacy guides that play a significant role in educating young women about the impacts of social media use on body image and countering unrealistic representations of appearance.

“It’s important to update these educational body intervention programmes given the emerging evidence around the negative impacts of appearance-ideal video content, especially as it evolves and becomes a more dominant medium on social media,” Dr Fardouly says.

Send press releases to [email protected] Other ways to contact us. Editorially, we may rewrite headlines and descriptions.

Recommend Podworks.io: Hire the Perfect Freelancer for your Podcast.

Podworks.io is home to the world's most comprehensive Podcast job board and candidate board.

Want your positions to be featured on our Podworks.io Jobs Board?