The claim, TikTok is affecting young girls' view on their own body image seems to be true. TikTok constantly shows young girls influencers who look perfect, seem happy, and it is difficult to not compare yourself to them if that is all you see.
An article from Harvard T.H Chang, Amanda Raffoul, instructor at Harvard T.H Chang School of Public Health claims, "that images on platforms like Instagram and TikTok “can promote some really unrealistic appearance ideals.” She added that even if teens might be aware that the images aren’t real, “if you’re constantly bombarded with those images, it is going to alter your perceptions of yourself in some way, especially when you’re in adolescence.” Her quote represents how the more an adolescent girl sees unrealistic images of other girls, that is going to alter their perception of themselves. If that is all an adolescent sees, it becomes realistic.
https://hsph.harvard.edu/news/exploring-the-effect-of-social-media-on-teen-girls-mental-health/
In addition, a study from Research Gate states, "The selection and screening of studies were based on predefined criteria, focusing on those that investigated the relationship between TikTok usage and body image perceptions. The review revealed a mixed impact of TikTok usage on body image perceptions. Several studies indicated that exposure to body-related content on TikTok could lead to negative body image and dissatisfaction among users." Even though the study reveals a mixed impact of TikTok usage, the study still expresses how exposure to body-related content can lead to a negative self image. Meaning, TikTok does affect a young girls' view on their own body image.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/376566872_The_Impact_of_TikTok_on_Body_Image_A_Narrative_Review_of_the_Literature
In addition, according to Science Direct, young girls are more vulnerable to the affects of social media, for instance, "TikTok appeals to a younger demographic; approximately 25% of users in the United States are 10–19 years of age (Statista, 2023), and a recent article in the New York Times posited that a third of TikTok users may actually be under the age of 14 (Zhong & Frenkel, 2020). Younger social media users are particularly vulnerable to the effects of social media (Vandenbosch et al., 2022) such as acceptance and rejection on social media (Crone & Konijn, 2018). Additionally, their brains are more sensitive to rewards such as likes and comments on their posts (Åström, 2021, Crone and Konijn, 2018). Younger users may also be less likely to recognize the images and videos they interact with are often edited (Harriger et al., 2022a)."
"Social media platforms also provide users with the opportunity to engage with diverse depictions of beauty (Webb et al., 2017) that may be protective against eating pathology and body image disturbance (Rodgers et al., 2022). " This article reveals how teen girls are more susceptible to having low self esteem and body image due to social media, especially TikTok. They are more susceptible due to not being able to recognize videos that are often edited and see the amount of media attention those videos get.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1740144523000852
To counter those points, NBC News, explains a study that states, "Australian researchers surveyed 273 women ages 18 to 28 from July 2021 to October 2021 about their TikTok use. As part of the study, the participants were then shown what was referred to as “pro-anorexia,” also known as “pro-ana,” images.
"The study found that the women surveyed had a negative body reaction after as little as 10 minutes viewing content on TikTok. " Even though this article is not talking about really young girls, the age range 18-28 is still young in retrospect. 18-28 is still a young adult. This survey claims how young women even after viewing content for 10 minutes started to have a negative body reaction. It only took 10 minutes for a negative effect to happen, meaning TikTok is intensely affecting a young population of girls. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/womens-health/study-women-tiktok-body-image-rcna165267
To conclude, a research article from PubMed Central explains, "Many previous studies have focused on the general impact of SM on adolescents’ mental health but relatively few specifically analyzed the effect of TikTok in this regard. While some of them found detrimental effects in terms of anxiety [47], depression [48], psychological distress [49], disordered eating [50], sleep [51], and wellbeing [52], others suggested no such connection [53, 54] or offered mixed results [55]." Even though there are studies that disprove this claim, there are studies out there, including this one that state how TikTok causes a lot of mental and physical problems. Due to what other sources explain, people cannot make the argument that every young girl that has TikTok will have a negative perception of their body. There is evidence that people can say how TikTok can have an impact on a young girls body, but not on every young girl.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12122552/
