Article Summary by Bethany L. Johnson, Margaret M. Quinlan and Audrey Curry

Have you ever implemented dietary, wellness or health advice from a TikTok video? You probably aren’t alone. In this study, we explore the health, wellness, and fitness content on TikTok with a focus on a particular phase in life—the postpartum period, and we explore the specific social expectation for postpartum folks known as “bouncing back.” Bouncing back is a relatively new expectation for parents (particularly mothers), so we examine this expectation as a form of modern maternity. Since social media use is linked to negative mental health effects like low self-esteem, increased stress, and disordered eating, it’s crucial to examine these “bounce-back” postpartum videos on TikTok. We analyzed 175 videos and identified three major themes: (1) Smoothies: eat, but don’t get fat; (2) Bone broth: bounce back with trendy wellness; (3) Fitspo: exercise is important. These videos often promote outdated ideas about what makes a “good” or “bad” body, repeat old diet-culture advice (like drinking water to feel full), and can set harmful expectations for new parents based on traditional views of gender, race, and class. Understanding the history behind these TikTok trends can help health professionals, researchers, and users recognize and address the potential harm of such content. Future research should also look at other groups on TikTok, such as teen mothers and trans parents, to understand the messages they receive and their impact.

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Read the full article on the Medical Humanities journal website.

Bethany Johnson (MPhil, M.A.) is a doctoral candidate (ABD) in the history of science, technology, and the environment at the University of South Carolina and a research affiliate faculty in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She explores how institutions and individuals create, normalize, and reproduce science, medical technology, and public health discourse from the nineteenth century to the present. She has published more than a dozen articles in journals such as Health Communication and the Social History of Medicine. She co-authored: You’re doing it wrong! Mothering, media, and medical expertise.

Margaret M. Quinlan (Ph.D., Ohio University, 2009) is a Professor of Communication and Director of Health & Medical at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She explores how communication creates, resists and transforms knowledges about bodies. Dr. Quinlan authored approximately 40 journal articles, 17 book chapters and co-produced documentaries in a regional Emmy award-winning series (National Distribution with PBS and available on Amazon). She co-authored: You’re doing it wrong! Mothering, media, and medical expertise.

Audrey M. Curry is a recent graduate from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte (2024) whose research focuses on maternity and postpartum in new media. She has two other articles published on the subject.

Links to the authors’ research:

• Johnson and Quinlan Research: Partnership
• Johnson and Quinlan Research: Community
• Exploring Community Responses to the Plague in the 16th Century
• Novelty of Doom