How Social Media Affects Eating Disorders
Facebook is less than two decades old, but it feels like it’s been around forever. In roughly 15 years or so, social media has deeply embedded itself into our lives—for better and for worse. At least 80 percent of Americans use social media on a daily basis. This reality can severely impact our collective mental and physical well-being.
Take, for example, eating disorders. They often emerge in the adolescent or teen years. Meanwhile, the demographic most likely to use TikTok is between 10 and 19 years old. An image-based social media platform has the potential to deeply affect a young person’s choices.
How Social Media Affects Eating Disorders
Eating disorders are believed to be caused by a wide variety of factors. Social media neatly intersects with some of these possible causes, e.g.:
Seeing posts about exercise, body image, dieting, and related topics can be triggering. Young people can feel ashamed that they do not live up to such unrealistic standards.
Platforms focusing on photos and videos set the bar for what a young person “should” look like. They also equate physical appearance with happiness and success.
Social media is a massive social experiment when it comes to peer pressure. The opinions of strangers (or even bots) can play a major role in a teen’s self-esteem.
The internet, in general, and social media, in particular, are hotbeds of bullying. It’s been found that two out of three Americans with eating disorders report that bullying was a factor in their condition.
In a Recent Study of Middle School Students
The findings included:
Seventy-five percent of girls and 70 percent of boys had at least one social media account (the most common being Instagram).
Roughly half of those children (more girls than boys) engaged in behaviors like extreme exercise and/or skipping meals.
The more time they spent online, the more overthinking they did about body weight and shape.
In other studies, the numbers were alarming:
By age 12, seven out of 10 children have their own smartphones and use them regularly.
Seventy percent of teens use social media every single day.
More than half of “tweens” watch online videos daily.
Most teens agree that their parents would be far more concerned if they could witness their behavior on social media.
The risk of developing an eating disorder rises significantly in children and teens who spend a lot of time on social media. Obviously, more research must be done. But, in the meantime, it seems prudent to acknowledge the correlation and take urgent measures to lessen the impact.
Taking Steps to Counter This Trend
Eating disorders are very serious conditions. This scenario is not a phase, and it requires professional intervention. In the meantime, young people must get some rational guidance about how they use their online time.
Encourage them to take regular tech breaks and prioritize face-to-face interactions with friends.
Educate them about how images can be manipulated and hence, cannot be trusted to portray how people really look.
Fact-check posts that make claims about body types, weight, exercise, diet, and other related topics.
Get to know their friends—on and offline—to discern who might be influencing them.
Most importantly, if you have reason to believe your child is struggling with disordered eating, get them in touch with a counselor. They might not want to hear advice from you but getting them to therapy is a chance for them to discuss themselves in privacy and on their terms.
If you, as a parent, feel overwhelmed when dealing with this situation, perhaps you could use a safe space. Let’s connect and talk about all of this during a free and confidential consultation.
Learn more about our eating disorder therapy in Plainview, New York
