Fitspiration: Fitness Culture on Instagram and Young Adults’ Exercise Habits, Eating Attitudes and Body Image

Abstract

A supposedly healthy alternative to thinspiration, “fitspiration” is a social media trend that idealizes fit, muscular and strong bodies. These posts contain content that emphasise fitness through exercise and change in eating habits, which if performed excessively, can lead to maladaptive behaviors. Further, the content on fitspiration provides for prototypes of “fit” bodies, which, while visually appealing, are unachievable for many. Therefore, with an aim to understand the impact of fitspiration content, as disseminated on social media (Instagram), in determining one’s exercise patterns, eating attitudes and body image, a correlational design was adopted for this study. For the purpose of which, four scales i.e., the passive and active use measure, obligatory exercise questionnaire, eating attitudes test (EAT-26) and the multidimensional body-self relations questionnaire-appearance scales (MBSRQ-AS), were administered on a sample of 138 young adults between age group of 18-28 years. The significant correlations found between the various scales indicate that accessing fitspiration content can establish or maintain maladaptive behaviours such as obligatory exercising and unhealthy eating attitudes. The study implies to spread awareness about the potential harm of such content to facilitate a certain degree of mindfulness while engaging with the same, as well as sensitizes those who knowingly or unknowingly propagate harmful messages.