You know when you meet a health care professional and you have that feeling of, “Wow, I love the way they communicate! There’s kindness, clarity, and respect”? I hope you say yes!
Well, my guest on my podcast, and the blog this week is exactly that type of provider. Dr. Jennifer Gaudiani (who is called Dr G by her patients) is an internist, author, and a renowned eating disorder expert.
The podcast released yesterday is titled: Social Media’s Influence on Eating Disorders: Insights from Dr. G.
I highly recommend it for you and any teens in your life. Please also know the conversation and this blog includes discussion of eating disorders, body image, and related experiences, so please read or listen with care. And if you or someone you love is affected by these issues you can find a list of support resources below.
In this blog, I highlight a few key points made by Dr. G, regarding media influences and disordered eating. This goes beyond all the skinny images that abound. Things like “SkinnyTok,” which was recently banned by TikTok but is still omnipresent.
In the pod, you’ll hear some fascinating and very helpful examples of how Dr. Gaudiani talks with teens who are experiencing eating disorders. Listeners will definitely notice that her style of talking with teens applies to all sorts of situations, not just around this topic. Give it a listen to see what I mean.
Learn more about showing our movies in your school or community!
Join Screenagers filmmaker Delaney Ruston MD for our latest Podcast
Learn more about our Screen-Free Sleep campaign at the website!
Our movie made for parents and educators of younger kids
Learn more about showing our movies in your school or community!
In the podcast, Dr. Gaudiani talks about how to untangle the nuances behind eating disorders, distinguishing them from disordered eating, which can often affect far more teens. She also talks about the underrecognized problem of compulsive exercise.
Youth are getting all sorts of “health” messages online, but when does what they see and hear start leading them into unhealthy thinking and behaviors?
Dr. G addresses how platforms like TikTok and Instagram often become breeding grounds for harmful practices disguised as wellness tips. These influences can lead teens down a dark path of food restriction and body insecurity, fueled by an incessant cycle of comparison and the desire for acceptance. In the podcast, she says,
“I see teens who find food rules on TikTok who say, ‘Here’s what I eat in a day,’ and they follow some influencer who looks slender, appealing, accomplished — someone giving a series of food rules that are really arbitrary but couched in anti-scientific terms, like, ‘I’m not dieting, I’m just watching my inflammation,’ or ‘I’m not dieting, I just want better energy.’
Inevitably, there’s a meaningfully restrictive aspect to whatever’s being recommended, because that’s what’s being influenced: Do as I do, and you’ll look like me, or have the power that I have.”
She goes on to say:
“It’s when there starts to become an inability to shift off those rules — when the kid starts to get really triggered and anxious and resistant when something else is offered, when eating spontaneously occurs, when something unexpected like, ‘Hey, let’s go out to dinner tonight,’ happens — and they get that clench.
That’s when I would start to say, we need to look a little more into this, ’cause maybe this has got its hooks too deep.”
It’s crucial that we talk with kids, starting even at age 9 or 10, about how tricky it can be to know what is actually healthy information versus unhealthy information. Even if kids don’t have social media per se, many are on YouTube, or their friends are on social media, and that info gets shared in lunchrooms and group chats.
Let me end with one more excellent point Dr. Gaudiani made — a great one to discuss with youth:
“And the truth is, historically, so many so-called food and body influencers fall out of the public eye. A number of them come back later and say, ‘I’m really sorry. I was peddling something that made me so sick.
In my vegan recommendations, in my intensive vegetarian recommendations, I actually had to stop working and tend to my health. So I’m so sorry.’”
National Alliance for Eating Disorders (“The Alliance”)
National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA)
Crisis Text Line
The Trevor Project (LGBTQ+ Youth)
Learn more about showing our movies in your school or community!
Join Screenagers filmmaker Delaney Ruston MD for our latest Podcast
Learn more about our Screen-Free Sleep campaign at the website!
Our movie made for parents and educators of younger kids
Join Screenagers filmmaker Delaney Ruston MD for our latest Podcast
Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube Channel! We add new videos regularly and you'll find over 100 videos covering parenting advice, guidance, podcasts, movie clips and more. Here's our most recent:
As we’re about to celebrate 10 years of Screenagers, we want to hear what’s been most helpful and what you’d like to see next.
Please click here to share your thoughts with us in our community survey. It only takes 5–10 minutes, and everyone who completes it will be entered to win one of five $50 Amazon vouchers.
You know when you meet a health care professional and you have that feeling of, “Wow, I love the way they communicate! There’s kindness, clarity, and respect”? I hope you say yes!
Well, my guest on my podcast, and the blog this week is exactly that type of provider. Dr. Jennifer Gaudiani (who is called Dr G by her patients) is an internist, author, and a renowned eating disorder expert.
The podcast released yesterday is titled: Social Media’s Influence on Eating Disorders: Insights from Dr. G.
I highly recommend it for you and any teens in your life. Please also know the conversation and this blog includes discussion of eating disorders, body image, and related experiences, so please read or listen with care. And if you or someone you love is affected by these issues you can find a list of support resources below.
In this blog, I highlight a few key points made by Dr. G, regarding media influences and disordered eating. This goes beyond all the skinny images that abound. Things like “SkinnyTok,” which was recently banned by TikTok but is still omnipresent.
In the pod, you’ll hear some fascinating and very helpful examples of how Dr. Gaudiani talks with teens who are experiencing eating disorders. Listeners will definitely notice that her style of talking with teens applies to all sorts of situations, not just around this topic. Give it a listen to see what I mean.
In the podcast, Dr. Gaudiani talks about how to untangle the nuances behind eating disorders, distinguishing them from disordered eating, which can often affect far more teens. She also talks about the underrecognized problem of compulsive exercise.
Youth are getting all sorts of “health” messages online, but when does what they see and hear start leading them into unhealthy thinking and behaviors?
Dr. G addresses how platforms like TikTok and Instagram often become breeding grounds for harmful practices disguised as wellness tips. These influences can lead teens down a dark path of food restriction and body insecurity, fueled by an incessant cycle of comparison and the desire for acceptance. In the podcast, she says,
“I see teens who find food rules on TikTok who say, ‘Here’s what I eat in a day,’ and they follow some influencer who looks slender, appealing, accomplished — someone giving a series of food rules that are really arbitrary but couched in anti-scientific terms, like, ‘I’m not dieting, I’m just watching my inflammation,’ or ‘I’m not dieting, I just want better energy.’
Inevitably, there’s a meaningfully restrictive aspect to whatever’s being recommended, because that’s what’s being influenced: Do as I do, and you’ll look like me, or have the power that I have.”
She goes on to say:
“It’s when there starts to become an inability to shift off those rules — when the kid starts to get really triggered and anxious and resistant when something else is offered, when eating spontaneously occurs, when something unexpected like, ‘Hey, let’s go out to dinner tonight,’ happens — and they get that clench.
That’s when I would start to say, we need to look a little more into this, ’cause maybe this has got its hooks too deep.”
It’s crucial that we talk with kids, starting even at age 9 or 10, about how tricky it can be to know what is actually healthy information versus unhealthy information. Even if kids don’t have social media per se, many are on YouTube, or their friends are on social media, and that info gets shared in lunchrooms and group chats.
Let me end with one more excellent point Dr. Gaudiani made — a great one to discuss with youth:
“And the truth is, historically, so many so-called food and body influencers fall out of the public eye. A number of them come back later and say, ‘I’m really sorry. I was peddling something that made me so sick.
In my vegan recommendations, in my intensive vegetarian recommendations, I actually had to stop working and tend to my health. So I’m so sorry.’”
National Alliance for Eating Disorders (“The Alliance”)
National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA)
Crisis Text Line
The Trevor Project (LGBTQ+ Youth)
Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube Channel! We add new videos regularly and you'll find over 100 videos covering parenting advice, guidance, podcasts, movie clips and more. Here's our most recent:
Sign up here to receive the weekly Tech Talk Tuesdays newsletter from Screenagers filmmaker Delaney Ruston MD.
We respect your privacy.
You know when you meet a health care professional and you have that feeling of, “Wow, I love the way they communicate! There’s kindness, clarity, and respect”? I hope you say yes!
Well, my guest on my podcast, and the blog this week is exactly that type of provider. Dr. Jennifer Gaudiani (who is called Dr G by her patients) is an internist, author, and a renowned eating disorder expert.
The podcast released yesterday is titled: Social Media’s Influence on Eating Disorders: Insights from Dr. G.
I highly recommend it for you and any teens in your life. Please also know the conversation and this blog includes discussion of eating disorders, body image, and related experiences, so please read or listen with care. And if you or someone you love is affected by these issues you can find a list of support resources below.
In this blog, I highlight a few key points made by Dr. G, regarding media influences and disordered eating. This goes beyond all the skinny images that abound. Things like “SkinnyTok,” which was recently banned by TikTok but is still omnipresent.
In the pod, you’ll hear some fascinating and very helpful examples of how Dr. Gaudiani talks with teens who are experiencing eating disorders. Listeners will definitely notice that her style of talking with teens applies to all sorts of situations, not just around this topic. Give it a listen to see what I mean.
It feels like we’re finally hitting a tipping point. The harms from social media in young people’s lives have been building for far too long, and bold solutions can’t wait any longer. That’s why what just happened in Australia is extremely exciting. Their new nationwide move marks one of the biggest attempts yet to protect kids online. And as we released a new podcast episode yesterday featuring a mother who lost her 14-year-old son after a tragic connection made through social media, I couldn’t help but think: this is exactly the kind of real-world action families have been desperate for. In today’s blog, I share five key things to understand about what Australia is doing because it’s big, it’s controversial, and it might just spark global change.
READ MORE >
I hear from so many parents who feel conflicted about their own phone habits when it comes to modeling healthy use for their kids. They’ll say, “I tell my kids to get off their screens, but then I’m on mine all the time.” Today I introduce two moms who are taking on my One Small Change Challenge and share how you can try it too.
READ MORE >
A growing concern I have is how young girls, some as young as 7 or 8, are becoming fixated on beauty products. In Screenagers Elementary School Age Edition, we show clips of elementary-aged girls talking excitedly about their favorite skin and makeup items. In today's blog I look at how this beauty obsession is reaching younger ages, fueled by pervasive beauty ideals on social media.
READ MORE >for more like this, DR. DELANEY RUSTON'S NEW BOOK, PARENTING IN THE SCREEN AGE, IS THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE FOR TODAY’S PARENTS. WITH INSIGHTS ON SCREEN TIME FROM RESEARCHERS, INPUT FROM KIDS & TEENS, THIS BOOK IS PACKED WITH SOLUTIONS FOR HOW TO START AND SUSTAIN PRODUCTIVE FAMILY TALKS ABOUT TECHNOLOGY AND IT’S IMPACT ON OUR MENTAL WELLBEING.
