Syed-Abdul, Shabbir, et al. “Misleading Health-Related Information Promoted through Video-Based Social Media: Anorexia on YouTube.” Journal of Medical Internet Research, vol. 15, no. 2, 2013, https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.2237. 

Misleading Health-Related Information Promoted Through Video-Based Social Media: Anorexia on YouTube

 • Informative content: describes the health consequences of anorexia and offers recovery advice

 • Pro-anorexia content: Promotes anorexia as a fashion and a way to be beautiful; share ways for becoming and staying anorexic 

Definitions: informative content vs. pro-anorexia content

 • Study investigated anorexia related misinformation on YouTube 

 • 140 videos of 11 hours content reviewed by three doctors who classified the videos as informative, pro-anorexia, or others

 • 40 most viewed videos (20 informative and 20 pro-anorexia videos) were studied to measure viewer behavior.


Grinnell College

University of California, Berkeley

* Definition
* Terms
* Emergence
* Risks
* Similarities with and differences from diet culture

Pro-Eating Disorder Content

Pro-eating disorder (pro-ed) content is content created with the intention to promote eating disorders as a positive ailment

Pro-ED Content: What is it?

Goal and Methods of anorexia related misinformation on YouTube study


Pro-ED content initially emerged in the late 1990s/early 2000s, gaining prevalence with the creation of online blogs. Pro-ED content soon found its way to social media sites (Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, and TikTok), where it is most commonly found today.

Pro-ED Content Emergence

Exposure to Pro-ED content has a high potential to negatively impact its viewer, but is at an increased risk of harming the following groups:
* Adolescents, especially teenage girls
* Women
* Those with eating disorders
* Those in recovery from an eating disorder, as the content could trigger a relapse

Risks of Pro-ED Content

Pro-Ed content and diet culture are the same at a fundamental level. They both encourage people to decrease their caloric intake and exercise more in order to achieve their core goal of thinness. However, pro-ed content is far more extreme. While some diets encourage diets to only intake the caloric equivalent of their basic metabolic rate or BMS (the amount of calories burned through existing in a day) and frequently exercise, pro-ed content encourages viewers to eat hundreds less than this amount and exercise to excess. Therefore, it could be said that pro-ed content is the extremest progression of dieting.

Pro-Ed Content v. Diet Culture

Bond E. Virtually anorexic — Where's the harm? A research study on the risks of pro-anorexia websites. Children's Media Foundation. 2012. Nov 28, [2021-06-29]. https://www.thechildrensmediafoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Bond-2012-Research-on-pro-anorexia-websites.pdf.

Branley, D. B., & Covey, J. (2017). Pro-ana versus Pro-recovery: A Content Analytic Comparison of Social Media Users' Communication about Eating Disorders on Twitter and Tumblr. Frontiers in psychology, 8, 1356. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01356

Sukunesan, S., Huynh, M., & Sharp, G. (2021). Examining the Pro-Eating Disorders Community on Twitter Via the Hashtag #proana: Statistical Modeling Approach. JMIR mental health, 8(7), e24340. https://doi.org/10.2196/24340

Pro-ED Academic References

* Pro-ED: Pro-Eating Disorder
* Proana: Pro-Anorexia
* Promia: Pro-Bulimia
* Thinspo/Thinsporation: images of thin (and sometimes unhealthily thin) bodies intended to be used as aspirational imagery by those with eating disorders
* Fitspo/Fitsporation: images of in-shape "fit" bodies intended to be used as aspirational imagery by those with eating disorders

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