New research has found that individuals following health influencers reported more vigorous exercise and higher fruit and vegetable intake but also experienced more distress compared to individuals not following health influencers. Distress was particularly high among participants following food- and diet-related health influencers. The paper was published in Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace.
Influencers are individuals who have the ability to affect the purchasing decisions or opinions of others due to their authority, knowledge, position, or relationship with their audience, often through social media platforms. Influencers with many followers can shape trends, promote products, and affect public opinion by sharing their views and experiences.
Health influencers are a specific type of influencer who focus on topics related to health, wellness, and fitness. They share content about healthy living, exercise routines, nutrition, mental health, and various health topics. These influencers can be healthcare professionals, fitness trainers, nutritionists, or individuals who have gained credibility through personal health journeys. Through their platforms, health influencers aim to educate, motivate, and inspire their audience to adopt healthier lifestyles.
Study author Jack R. H. Cooper and his colleagues wanted to investigate the physical and mental health of young adults who follow health influencers on Instagram. They were particularly interested in young adults because they are the age group that follows social media much more than people of other ages and studies often indicate that mental health issues associated with problematic social media use are more common among them.
The researchers noted that following health influencers on social media can be beneficial as it may lead people to adopt healthier lifestyles. However, studies also indicate that health influencer content may reinforce the fit-ideal, leading to increased body dissatisfaction and depressive symptoms. The fit-ideal is the concept that an athletic or fit body is the ideal type of human body. Accepting this ideal can drive individuals to exercise compulsively and become obsessed with health and pure diets, creating mental health problems.
The study included 1,022 individuals aged between 18 and 25 years who took part in the “Lifestyles of Young Adults Survey.” They came from New Zealand (students of the University of Otago), the U.S. (MTurk workers), and the U.K. (recruited through Prolific). They received 10 NZD, 3.50 USD, or 4.00 GBP depending on their country for their participation.
The participants completed assessments of social media usage (“How often do you use the following social networking sites or apps?” followed by more specific questions depending on the initial answers), physical activity (the International Physical Activity Questionnaire – Short Form), dietary habits (a modification of the New Zealand Adult Nutrition Survey), mental health, mood, and well-being (the 8-item PROMIS Emotional Distress—Depression and the 8-item PROMIS Emotional Distress—Anxiety Short Form 8a questionnaires, a mood scale based on the affective circumplex, and the Flourishing scale).
Results showed that followers of health influencers more often exercised vigorously and ate more fruit and vegetables. However, they also reported higher levels of both distress and well-being. This difference in distress and well-being could not be accounted for by Instagram usage alone.
Further analyses revealed that whether a person followed health influencers or not changed the nature of the association between vigorous exercise and distress. Among followers of health influencers, more vigorous exercise was associated with higher distress levels. However, among individuals not using Instagram, more vigorous exercise was associated with lower levels of distress or not associated with it at all.
“Among health influencer followers, more vigorous physical activity was associated with higher distress levels. This was in sharp contrast to the lack of a relationship for non-followers, and the typical protective relationship in non-users of Instagram. These findings suggest that following health influencers may disrupt the positive relationship between health behaviors and mental health,” the study authors concluded.
The paper, “Healthier But Not Happier? The Lifestyle Habits of Health Influencer Followers,” was authored by Jack R. H. Cooper, Quinn Campbell, and Tamlin S. Conner.