University of Oregon Eugene, Oregon, United States
Disclosure(s):
Leah R. Wothe, MS: No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.
Objectives: It is increasingly common for young adults to turn to social media for dietary advice. One popular source of such information is ‘what I eat in a day’ (WIEIAD) posts. These posts visually chronicle the foods an individual eats throughout the day and can get over 65 million views. WIEIAD posts have the potential to spread misleading information and shape eating behaviors. Our research aims to identify nutritional messaging in WIEIAD posts. Specifically, we are analyzing the presence of calorie and macronutrient tracking, and gender differences depicted in WIEIAD posts.
Methods: TikTok WIEIAD posts (N=334, 186 female-presenting creators (FPCs)) were collected from 160 participants via crowdsourcing for content analysis. Trained coders coded the WIEIADs for the creators' gender presentation, their participation in calorie and macronutrient tracking, the number of calories reported, and the grams of each macronutrient reported.
Results: Significantly more male-presenting creators (MPCs) (31%) than FPCs (10%) posted WIEIADs that included calorie tracking in their posts, X2(1, N=334) = 21.02, p <.001. For those who counted calories, MPCs reported consuming significantly more calories than FPCs (W=675, p <.001). Similarly, MPCs were significantly more likely to report macronutrient tracking (29%) than FPCs (16%), X2(1, N=334) = 6.97, p=.008). These findings highlight gender differences in nutritional tracking behaviors, with MPCs showing a greater emphasis on tracking of their diets on social media.
Of those who tracked macronutrients (protein, carbohydrates, fat), creators mentioned tracking all three or only protein. MPCs tracked three macronutrients significantly more than FPCs (Fisher’s exact test p < .001). FPCs tended to only track their protein consumption. This may indicate a priority for protein consumption in FPCs over carbohydrates and fat, while MPCs have a more comprehensive view of their diet.
Conclusions: This study identified gender differences in nutritional tracking behaviors in female- and male-presenting creators posting WIEIAD videos. These differences offer valuable insights into nutritional messaging on social media which may influence viewers to model their dietary choices after the trends shown in such posts.
Funding Sources: No funding was obtained to undertake this study.
