Abstract:

This essay focuses on the impact of social media, particularly TikTok, on the mental well-being of young individuals, with a specific focus on the fitness community within the platform. It further uncovers the increase of harmful content within the Gymtok community, marked by body shaming and toxic behaviours, creating anxiety and fear among users. Further, this essay highlights the influence of unqualified influencers, inadequate platform moderation, and the normalization of harmful eating trends on youth mental health. Moreover, the essay discusses TikTok’s lack of content moderation, allowing pro-eating disorder content and harmful weight loss advice to be promoted. This absence of moderation perpetuates a toxic online environment, significantly impacting the mental health of young users.

Introduction:

The growth of fitness content across social media platforms is significantly impacting the mental health of young viewers. Fazima Karim (2020) outlines that “social media affects the mental health of users by influencing how people view, maintain, and interact with their social network.” This theory can be expanded to illustrate how body image and self-perception are negatively affected as individuals engage with social media. The World Health Organization reports that the prevalence of mental health issues is increasing at a rate of 13% per year (World Health Organization, 2021), attributed in part to the growth of these social media platforms. Particularly concerning is the introduction of TikTok as a social media platform, exacerbating the issue, with 1 in 7 adolescents across TikTok between the ages of 10-19 struggling with mental health challenges (World Health Organization, 2021). Furthermore, a recent study revealed the adverse effects of fitness content on TikTok, noting “a significant decrease in state body dissatisfaction across time points for participants” as they engaged with fitness-focused TikTok videos (Pryde and Prichard, 2022). While fitness content on TikTok can provide positive advice and assistance, this paper aims to emphasize the negative impact of fitness content, particularly within the Gymtok community, coupled with unqualified fitness influencers and inadequate platform moderation, on the mental well-being of young users.

 

TikTok’s toxic fitness community

The expansion of TikTok’s fitness community, known as “gymtok,” initially promising diverse content, has devolved into a toxic space marked by judgment and body shaming, fostering widespread anxiety and fear, particularly among newcomers to fitness. TikTok, created by the Chinese company ByteDance, focuses on video sharing and allows users to create and view videos covering a diverse range of topics, from comedy skits and beauty tutorials to educational and political content (Bhandari Aparajita, 2022). Since its release in 2016, TikTok has been downloaded over 2.6 billion times worldwide, with a large majority of these downloads occurring throughout 2020. As of 2021, there are over 1 billion monthly active users (Bhandari Aparajita, 2022). Its rapid rise in popularity can be credited in part to its unique algorithm, unlike any other platform, which focuses on user experience and is driven by what is called the “For You” algorithm (Xu et al., 2019). This algorithm determines the type of content the user will see and tailors the feed based on their interactions, making it more personalized to them. One community that is very popular on TikTok and hence has a large number of videos that the algorithm then sends out to users is the fitness community, in particular, the “gymtok” community. The hashtag “gymtok” has over 19 million posts and focuses on fitness and workout advice for people of all levels. This community in particular saw a large resurgence and growth at the end of COVID-19 as individuals returned to the gym and wanted to implement a healthier lifestyle. As a result, more content focused on a beginner’s introduction to the gym and more fitness and workout advice was released (Ananthakrishnan et al., 2020). However, this seemingly positive trend lies deep in toxicity as the content within the “gymtok” community has turned into a space where individuals feel judged, excluded, and pressured to conform, as body shaming and subtle forms of exclusivity and elitism take place (Rivas Daniel, 2023). A recent trend on TikTok, spread under the hashtag “gymtok,” which saw users filming others in the gym using equipment and doing their workout routine with the intent of making fun of them through their form or incorrect use of equipment. For example, a pair of fitness influencers under @fit.berna created a video titled “copying the weird man in the corner of the gym,” which consisted of them laughing and mocking a man participating in his workout, oblivious to the bullying going on behind him (NZ Herald, 2023). This is one video, similar to many, where users take the opportunity to belittle others, cultivating a toxic online gym community. This trend and community have led to feelings of anxiety and fear among individuals, specifically those new to the gym, scared to enter the fitness space. This trend of videos has contributed to “gym anxiety,” a term that Vara Saripali describes as “the anxiety a person feels whilst exercising in a public gym, as they worry about their ability and appearance.” This feeling of anxiety is rooted in a fear of embarrassment and being mocked, fear of using new gym equipment, and fear of making a mistake. This anxiety is only becoming more common as a study interviewed 3,000 people in the US, and almost 90% of people interviewed shared this notion, with 38% of Gen Z participants all sharing a fear of judgment relating to the toxic gym community being built online (Halsall Adele, 2022). Further, TikTok, and in particular “Gymtok,” has become a community where fear and anxiety are high as user’s internal fears are reflected by what they see online. This turn to toxicity has seen a major decline to youth mental health.

 

 

Harmful impact of fitness influencers

The surge of online fitness influencers, particularly within TikTok’s “Gymtok “community, perpetuates harmful eating trends and unrealistic body standards, contributing to the deterioration to young users’ mental well-being. The online fitness community has witnessed a surge in both participants and influencers, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, as people sought guidance for their fitness journeys, resulting in an influx of new influencers providing advice, notably on TikTok. Consequently, there has been a noticeable shift in content, with an emphasis on “thinspiration” and “fitspiration. TikTok, being a platform primarily driven by user-generated content, often lacks scientific backing for the information shared, leading to the propagation of content like “what I eat in a day” and low-calorie meal ideas, despite influencers having limited expertise in nutrition (Vasconelos Catarina, 2019). Despite their lack of qualifications, these influencers are often perceived as credible experts due to their personal brands, perpetuating misinformation and fostering misplaced trust among their followers. Consequently, TikTok’s content landscape has evolved to normalise detrimental eating trends, with influencers advocating for “clean” diets and minimal calorie intake, despite warnings from the medical community about the associated health risks, including the development of eating disorders (Myrick and Erlichman, 2020). In 2019, a study conducted by the International Central Institute for Youth and Educational Television and the Landshut University of Applied Sciences highlighted the unhealthy relationships that many individuals developed with influencers like Pamela Reif and Anne Kissner, whose platforms promote extreme dieting behaviours as normal and healthy, with a quarter of surveyed participants reported having an extremely unhealthy relationship with such influencers (Gotz and Wunderer, 2019). Given that TikTok’s user base is mainly aged between 16 and 24, a developmental stage characterised by increased susceptibility to external influences, with nearly 90% of participants in a US study expressing concerns about judgment from the toxic online gym community (Yang and Zilderberg, 2020; Halsall Adele, 2022), the impact of these influencers on youth mental health is particularly concerning. An anonymous paper survey further underscored the adverse effects of the TikTok fitness community, with a majority of participants reporting harmful changes to their daily lives and diets, resulting in long-term health consequences, as nearly 60% of surveyed individuals reported seeing harmful changes to their day-to-day lives and diets due to TikTok content (Prucolli et al., 2022). Overall, the prevalence of harmful misinformation within the fitness community, exacerbated by the proliferation of online influencers, significantly contributes to the rising incidence of eating disorders and the deterioration of youth mental health. This highlights the urgent need for greater scrutiny and accountability regarding the content disseminated by fitness influencers on platforms like TikTok, especially within the “Gymtok” community, to safeguard the mental well-being of young users.

 

 

 

TikTok’s lack of content moderation

TikTok’s fitness community is increasingly becoming a hazardous environment for its users due to the absence of effective moderation and control over the content posted. There has been a noticeable shift towards allowing pro-eating disorder content and harmful weight loss advice, raising concerns about the platform’s lack of oversight. The Centre for Digital Hate conducted an analysis revealing that TikTok’s algorithm fails to adequately moderate content related to weight loss and eating disorders, with such videos being recommended to new users within just 30 minutes of joining the app (Maheswari Sapna, 2022). This failure in moderation has led to harmful effects on users, as these videos are pushed onto vulnerable individuals by the algorithm. Despite TikTok’s claims of not allowing content that promotes or glorifies eating disorders and its purported tightening of guidelines in 2020 (Paul Kari, 2021), it has been discovered that numerous problematic hashtags, such as #thinspiration and #weightlossprogress, have managed to evade these regulations, accumulating over 1.7 billion views. These hashtags are commonly used within the fitness community, with users mirroring the harmful behaviours depicted in these videos and offering advice in the comments section. Under the hashtag #weightlossprogress, for instance, users solicit tips for their fitness journey, only to receive harmful recommendations advocating for using coffee and smoking as meal replacements, along with suggestions for extreme low-calorie diets (Dempster Alice, 2020). With billions of views, TikTok remains complicit in perpetuating this toxic and harmful community by failing to implement adequate moderation measures. The Butterfly Foundation, a prominent eating disorder support group, has emphasised the inadequacy of TikTok’s guidelines in restricting access to these videos promoting unhealthy methods, identifying it as an urgent issue (Butterfly Foundation, 2020). The absence of video and comment moderation has created a toxic environment where users are constantly exposed to damaging content related to fuelling eating disorders, significantly impacting the mental health of young users. Alexandra Dane’s research (2023) further highlights the detrimental effects of TikTok’s lack of moderation, describing these videos and comments as “extremely triggering” and exacerbating eating disorder pathology among young people. This highlights the critical need for stronger guidelines and moderation across all forms of content within the fitness community on TikTok. In conclusion, the unregulated proliferation of harmful content on TikTok, particularly within the fitness community, poses a growing threat to the well-being of its participants, necessitating urgent intervention through stronger moderation and guidelines to combat the promotion of pro-eating disorder content and harmful weight loss advice.

 

 

Conclusion:

The growth of harmful fitness content on TikTok, illustrated by the toxic “gymtok” community and the growth of eating disorders and harmful weight loss advice by unqualified influencers, underscores a troubling failure in platform moderation. This unchecked dissemination poses a significant threat to the mental well-being of TikTok’s predominantly young user base. Despite the platform’s global popularity and extensive user engagement, its relaxed approach to content regulation has allowed harmful trends to flourish, contributing to a decline in youth mental health. This alarming reality underscores the urgent need for TikTok to implement stricter moderation policies and guidelines, in line with its responsibility to protect its users from harmful content.

 

Furthermore, although TikTok has received the majority of our attention, its consequences go beyond one platform, highlighting the need for increased awareness and action across a variety of social media platforms. Therefore, in order to protect young people’s mental health in the digital age, platform operators, regulators, and society at large must work together to address these challenges. Ignoring these problems could lead to a vicious circle of detrimental effects on the mental health of adolescent users, underscoring the platform’s inadequacies in providing a secure and encouraging online environment and community.

 

 

 

References

Beyari, H. (2023). The relationship between social media and the increase in mental health problems. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(3), 2383. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20032383

Bhandari, A., & Bimo, S. (2022). Why’s Everyone on TikTok Now? The Algorithmized Self and The Future of Self-Making on Social Media. Social Media + Society, 8(1), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1177/20563051221086241

Butterfly Foundation. (2020). Support for Australians Experiencing Eating Disorders. Butterfly Foundation. https://butterfly.org.au/

Chou, W.-Y. S., Oh, A., & Klein, W. M. P. (2018). Addressing Health-Related Misinformation on Social Media. Jama, 320(23). https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2018.16865

Cuncic, A. (2020, November 19). How to Cope With Social Anxiety at the Gym. Verywell Mind. https://www.verywellmind.com/cope-with-social-anxiety-at-the-gym-4125214

Dane, A., & Bhatia, K. (2023). The social media diet: A scoping review to investigate the association between social media, body image and eating disorders amongst young people. PLOS Global Public Health, 3(3), e0001091. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgph.0001091

Dempster, A. (2020, May 12). “Extremely unsafe”: TikTok videos fuelling eating disorders amid coronavirus lockdowns, experts warn. Www.abc.net.au. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-13/experts-concerned-tiktok-content-fuelling-eating-disorders/12215986

Gotz, M., & Wunderer, E. (2019). Girls ‒ Instagram ‒ Eating Disorders . https://izi.br.de/english/press/PM_Eating_Disorders.pdf

Halsall, A. (2022, May 3). Gym Anxiety: Which States are Most Affected? MYPROTEIN^TM. https://us.myprotein.com/thezone/motivation/which-states-are-most-impacted-by-gymtimidation/

Karim, F. (2020). Social Media Use and Its Connection to Mental Health: A Systematic Review. Cureus, 12(6). https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.8627

Li, W., Ding, H., Xu, G., & Yang, J. (2023). The Impact of Fitness Influencers on a Social Media Platform on Exercise Intention during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Role of Parasocial Relationships. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(2), 1113. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20021113

Maheshwari, S. (2022, December 14). Young TikTok Users Quickly Encounter Problematic Posts, Researchers Say. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/14/business/tiktok-safety-teens-eating-disorders-self-harm.html

Myrick, J. G., & Erlichman, S. (2019). How audience involvement and social norms foster vulnerability to celebrity-based dietary misinformation. Psychology of Popular Media Culture, 9(3). https://doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000229

Nelson, M., Rejeski, J., Blair, S., Duncan, P., Judge , J., King, A., Macera, C., & Castaenda-Sceppa, C. (2007). Physical Activity and Public Health in Older Adults. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 39(8), 1435–1445. https://doi.org/10.1249/mss.0b013e3180616aa2

NZ Herald. (2024, April 11). Watch: Fitness influencers slammed for “disgusting” act. NZ Herald. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/fitness-influencers-slammed-after-making-fun-of-male-gym-goers-workout/SHR7R7HL3RCNRD25MGMUSMECT4/

Paul, K. (2021, October 16). “It spreads like a disease”: how pro-eating-disorder videos reach teens on TikTok. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/16/tiktok-eating-disorder-thinspo-teens

Pruccoli, J., De Rosa, M., Chiasso, L., Perrone, A., & Parmeggiani, A. (2022). The use of TikTok among children and adolescents with Eating Disorders: experience in a third-level public Italian center during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Italian Journal of Pediatrics, 48(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13052-022-01308-4

Pryde, S., & Prichard, I. (2022). TikTok on the clock but the #fitspo don’t stop: The impact of TikTok fitspiration videos on women’s body image concerns. Body Image, 43, 244–252. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2022.09.004

Richards, R. (2023, November 13). Gym Anxiety: Why It’s Common and How to Manage It | Juniper. Www.myjuniper.com. https://www.myjuniper.com/blog/gym-anxiety

Rivas, D. (2023, August 16). Understanding toxic Gym Culture. Ninja Athlete. https://ninjathlete.com/en-au/blogs/article/understanding-toxic-gym-culture

Saripalli, V. (2022, April 27). Gym anxiety: How to manage it? Www.medicalnewstoday.com. https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/gym-anxiety

Vasconcelos, C. (2019). Fake News vs. Healthy Diet. https://repositorio.iscte-iul.pt/bitstream/10071/19036/1/master_catarina_pestana_vasconcelos.pdf

Westenberg, J. M., & Oberle, C. D. (2023). The impact of body-positivity and body-checking TikTok videos on body image. The Journal of Social Media in Society, 12(1), 49–60. https://thejsms.org/index.php/JSMS/article/view/1153/617

World Health Organisation. (2022). World mental health report: Transforming mental health for all. In The World Health Organisation. https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/356119/9789240049338-eng.pdf?sequence=1

Xu, L., Yan, X., & Zhang, Z. (2019). Research on the Causes of the “Tik Tok” App Becoming Popular and the Existing Problems. Journal of Advanced Management Science, 7(2), 59–63. https://doi.org/10.18178/joams.7.2.59-63

Yang, Y. (2020). Understanding Young Adults’ TikTok Usage —–Real People, Creative Videos that Makes Your Day. https://communication.ucsd.edu/_files/undergrad/yang-yuxin-understanding-young-adults-tiktok-usage.pdf