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Healthier but not happier? The lifestyle habits of health influencer followers
How young adults obtain health information has rapidly evolved due to the surge of social media and the emergence of Instagram health influencers. Therefore, it’s crucial to investigate whether following these influencers on Instagram benefits their audience’s physical and mental health. In this study by Cooper, Campbell & Conner (2024) involving 1,022 young adults aged 18 to 25 from New Zealand, the United States, and the United Kingdom, a survey conducted in 2021 assessed their lifestyle habits, including social media usage, diet, exercise, and mental health. The results revealed that followers of health influencers reported engaging in more vigorous exercise, consuming a higher quantity of fruits and vegetables, and experiencing better overall well-being. Even after controlling for a number of variables, including age, gender, ethnicity, education, socioeconomic level, and body mass index, they nonetheless showed higher signs of anxiety, despair, and bad mood in comparison to non-followers. Particularly, those who followed influencers focused on food or diet demonstrated significantly higher distress levels. Furthermore, following health influencers disrupted the expected protective association between healthy behaviors and distress. In followers of health influencers, engaging in more vigorous physical activity was linked to heightened levels of distress, a contrast to the absence of such a relationship among non-followers and the usual protective association observed in individuals not using Instagram. These findings indicate that following health influencers might interfere with the beneficial relationship between healthy behaviors and mental well-being. Future research examining longitudinal patterns could offer insight into the precise impact of following health influencers on mental health. [NPID: Instagram, health, influencer, flourishing, mental health, exercise, diet]
Year: 2024
