While scrolling through my Instagram Explore Page yesterday, I noticed that over half the posts I saw seemed to be geared toward healthy eating, dieting, and gym workouts. On the surface, it appears that Instagram is promoting healthy lifestyles that we should try to abide by—even though these posts tend to just make us feel guilty about our current lifestyles.
Although I try to eat healthy, exercise, and have a work-life balance, Instagram knows how to use its algorithm to make me feel like I’m not doing enough. Every few months, I notice that my Instagram is full of toxic diet culture posts that I can’t get rid of unless I delete the app for a while. When I noticed the posts started reappearing this time, I decided to do some research into Instagram’s algorithm and why it promotes toxic diet culture.
This led me to the Facebook Files, research that was conducted by Facebook and exposed last year. This research found that Facebook was damaging teenage girls’ body image and mental health, among other disturbing findings. Despite the knowledge of these results, Facebook kept this data hidden from the public, even sometimes stating facts in opposition to the results of the studies.
Why would Facebook keep this hidden? While this research clearly indicates Facebook should change what it is showing to teenage girls, the toxic posts also result in increased use of the app.
The impact of these studies has shaped Facebook and Instagram today. The ability to like, comment, repost, and share others’ posts significantly increased our interaction with these apps. Creating an Explore Page has also increased our use of social media, as we interact with more users than just those we follow. The sheer amount of content available to us is enough to keep anyone hooked on these apps for hours a day.
Using social media at such a high rate can damage our mental health. If you relate to my story above, you might find yourself frequently looking at posts of people at the gym, recipes for low-calorie foods, and “What I Eat In a Day” videos. Recent research demonstrates a strong correlation between one’s use of social media and their risk of developing eating disorders. This research also found that younger users, who are more likely to use Instagram, demonstrated a higher risk of developing eating disorders.
Instagram promotes disordered eating through the Explore Pages algorithm of teenage girls. The algorithm tracks what posts you interact with, so future posts on your Explore Page will feature similar content. As such, if users interact with a post about disordered eating, they will likely see similar content in the future. Furthermore, as the marketing on Instagram is constantly focused on physical perfectionism, we continually see celebrities promoting foods or diet teas that are not FDA-approved and could be damaging.
So, what can we do to help ourselves survive in this toxic diet culture that Instagram and Facebook promote? Firstly, Instagram created a setting which allows its users to see fewer weight loss advertisements. Other solutions might include setting a time limit on your phone for the Instagram or Facebook apps specifically. Personally, I find it difficult to stop using Instagram completely; a time limit allows me to use the app at a moderate level and be aware of how much time I’m using the app. If you are up for a challenge, try deleting Instagram for a few days at a time. I’m always shocked at how much time deleting this app frees up!
Toxic diet culture is challenging to avoid in modern society, but it is essential to be aware of how it might affect your mental health and daily activities. Changing your Instagram habits and being aware of the algorithm can help us stop the culture promoted on Instagram.