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. 2022 Mar 7;8(3):e25552. doi: 10.2196/25552

Table 3.

Summary of individual studies.

Article Platform Region Group Data Web-based social factors Primary findings Conceptual
Kang et al [75] Twitter United States UNKa 14,317 related tweets Policy

  • More negative tweets about the school meal policy have been detected. The main target negative opinions were campaign and food.

 Data collection
Fernandez-Luque et al [54] WhatsApp; Instagram Qatar Children UNK (intervention study) Gender, geo-cultural factors

  • More active users tend to have better health outcomes.

  • Females’ engagement with social media is higher.

  • Nutritional advice in weight loss campaigns must consider religious and cultural traditions.

 Intervention pathway
Lingetun et al [78] Blogs United States Pregnant women with obesity or overweight 13 internet blogs Gender

  • Three main themes of overweight pregnant women’s blogs were identified: pregnancy as an excuse, perspectives on the pregnant body, and becoming a mother.

 Data collection
May et al [65] Twitter United States Adults UNK (experiment study) Social support, gender, stigma

  • Investigated follow-back rates. The number of interactions and organic follows did not differ by weight status.

  • Peers interacted more with each other than with professionals.

  • Women need 5 weeks to build a web-based weight loss community on Twitter.

 Ancillary resource
Gore et al [57] Twitter United States UNK More than 25 million tweets Geo-cultural factors

  • Geological areas with lower obesity rates (1) have happier tweets and (2) have more frequently discussed food, particularly fruits and vegetables, and physical activities.

 Data collection
So et al [64] Twitter United States UNK 200,000 tweets Social sharing, school environment, obesogenic environment, stigma

  • Tweets that are emotionally evocative or humorous and express individual-level concerns for obesity were more frequently retweeted than their counterparts.

 Data collection
Kent et al [24] Facebook; Twitter United States UNK 291 Facebook posts; 1091 tweets Obesogenic environment

  • This study aimed to understand the connection between obesity and cancer from Facebook and Twitter. They found that (1) most tweets focused on an associative or causal link between obesity and cancer, and (2) tweets contained more negative sentiment than Facebook posts.

 Data collection
Harris et al [67] Twitter United States Children with obesity 1110 tweets Source credibility, policy, school environment

  • This study investigated the communication about obesity on Twitter, and they found that (1) more tweets focused on individual behavior than on policy or environment, and (2) government or educational tweets attract more attention, but the number of these tweets is less.

 Data collection
Kuebler et al [53] Yahoo! Answers United States Adults 3926 users’ questions; 300 bullying questions Gender, stigma, geo-cultural factors

  • Most women asking whether they were fat or obese were not fat or obese.

  • Users with obesity were significantly more likely to ask for advice about bullying than thinner users.

  • People with obesity who reside in counties with higher BMI may have better physical and mental health than people with obesity who live in counties with lower BMI.

 Data collection
Leggatt-Cook and Chamberla [43] Blogs United States Adults 10 blogs Social support

  • Weight loss bloggers typically write about daily success and failures, report calorie consumption, and exercise output, and post photographs of their changing bodies.

 Data collection
Mejova [62] Twitter United States UNK 1.5 million tweets Source credibility, stigma

  • Tweets afflicted with government or institution are likely to be retweeted more.

  • The need to address the quality control of health information on social media is proposed.

 Data collection
Munk et al [15] Instagram United Kingdom UNK 82,449 geotagged posts Obesogenic environment

  • Sunday night is a good time to post on Instagram.

  • There is no clear difference between thematic communities between high and low BMI areas.

 Data collection
Garimella et al [59] Instagram United States UNK 200,000 images Geo-cultural

  • Both user-provided and machine-generated image tags provide information that can be used to infer a county’s health statistics.

 Data collection
Culotta [58] Twitter United States UNK 1.4-M user profiles and 4.3 M tweets Geo-cultural

  • Six of 27 health statistics show a significant correlation with the linguistic analysis of the Twitter activity in the top 100 most populous counties in the United States.

  • Twitter information, together with demographic information, improves the model’s performance.

 Data collection
Abbar et al [52] Twitter United States UNK 892,000 tweets Geo-cultural

  • The caloric values of the foods mentioned in the tweets were analyzed in relation to the state-wide obesity rate.

 Data collection
Weber and Mejova [61] Twitter United States Overweight adults 1339 profile images Geo-cultural, stigma

  • User profile pictures could be used to obtain the user’s weight information.

 Data collection
Pappa et al [44] Reddit United States UNK Posts and comments of 107,886 unique users Social support, gender

  • The 10 most-discussed semantic topics on posts in the LoseIt Reddit community were related to healthy food, clothing, calorie counting, workouts, looks, habits, support, and unhealthy food.

 Data collection
Loh et al [82] Facebook; Instagram; Twitter United States Children UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • The study showed that social media and text messaging were innovative tools that should be included to increase the reach of multilevel community intervention.

 Intervention pathway
Ling et al [83] Facebook United States Children UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • Participants in the survey mentioned that they enjoyed the Facebook platform because it provided new recipe and activity ideas and an opportunity to interact with other participants.

 Intervention pathway
He et al [46] WeChat China Adults UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • An intervention based on WeChat platform was effective on weight loss only for males.

  • Females show more activities on WeChat, but they lost less weight during the study.

 Intervention pathway
Erdem and Sisik [68] YouTube United States Adults 175 videos Source credibility

  • There are no significant associations between the number of likes, dislikes, or views and usefulness score.

  • Videos uploaded by medical professionals typically contain more useful information.

 Data collection
Jane et al [37] Facebook Australia Adults with obesity or overweight UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • This study shows that participants do not rely on each other in the same way that they would typically rely on their offline social connections.

  • The Facebook group reported the greatest reductions in initial weight compared with the control group, which had no social media components.

 Intervention pathway
Fiks et al [79] Facebook United States low-come mothers with a newborn UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • Mothers of the intervention group were significantly less likely to pressure infants to finish food or give cereal in the bottle.

 Intervention pathway
Mejova et al [60] Instagram United States UNK 20,848,190 posts Obesogenic environment, social sharing

  • There is a link between obesity and the density of fast-food restaurants.

  • Food sharing behavior is higher for high-obesity areas.

 Data collection
Cunha et al [42] Reddit United States UNK 70,949 posts and 922,245 comments Social support

  • Users receiving feedback on their posts have a higher probability of returning to the community.

  • Returning users who received comments on their posts reported losing more weight.

 Data collection
Waring et al [39] Twitter United States Women of childbearing age UNK (intervention study) Gender, social support

  • Women of childbearing age are interested in a weight loss program that was delivered entirely via Twitter.

 Intervention pathway
Chomutare et al [47] UNK United States Women with obesity 140 Women with obesity in an internet group Gender, social support

  • Women with high web-based participation levels lost more weight than do women with low participation levels.

 Data collection
West et al [84] Facebook United States Adults UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • Students maintained their weight, with no significant difference between weight gain prevention intervention group and control group over 9 weeks.

 Intervention pathway
Aschbrenner et al [48] Facebook United States Adults with serious mental illness UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • This study shows that weight loss was significantly associated with perceived peer-group support.

 Intervention pathway
Merchant et al [40] Facebook United States Adults UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • In a Facebook group that involved weight-loss controlled trial, the following were noted: (1) Polls are the most popular posts followed by photos. (2) Participants visibly engaged with posts less over time. Of participants, 3.4% reported passively engaging with the Facebook page.

 Intervention pathway
Chen et al [51] HealthTogether Switzerland Adults UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • Collaborating with buddies to compete in achieving fitness goals in a group was reported as motivating for dyads with strong ties.

 Intervention pathway
Phan et al [50] Web-based social network United States Adults UNK (experiment study) Obesogenic environment

  • By incorporating all the human behavior determinants and environmental events, the proposed novel deep learning model achieves more accurate results in predicting the future activity levels of users.

 Ancillary resource
Savolainen [45] Blogs Finland UNK 50 blogs Social support

  • Blogs provide an emotionally supportive forum that mainly serves to share opinions and information; they were seldom used for seeking information.

 Data collection
Church et al [85] Facebook UNK Adults UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • Participants lose weight during the 6-week web-based clinical, emotional freedom techniques course and continue to lose weight in the following year, which indicates the long-term effects.

 Intervention pathway
Turner-McGrievy et al [86] Facebook United States Vegan women with polycystic ovary syndrome UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • The study result suggests that engagement with social media may be effective for short-term weight loss among vegan women with PCOSc.

 Intervention pathway
Lytle et al [49] Social support website United States 2-year college students UNK (intervention study) Social support, school environment

  • The social networking encouraged intervention group, and the control group does not have a significant difference in BMI at the end of the 24-month intervention study.

 Intervention pathway
Waring et al [41] Facebook United States Postpartum women with overweight or obesity UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • Facebook-based intervention is feasible for overweight and postpartum women with obesity in weight loss. However, research is further needed to determine how to engage participants in social networks better.

 Intervention pathway
Basch et al [69] YouTube United States UNK 98 weight loss videos Source credibility

  • The number of videos about weight loss on YouTube from professionals is lacking.

 Data collection
Webb et al [74] Instagram United States UNK 400 images Social movement

  • Health at every size–tagged posts contain more physically active portrayals and weight stigma than do posts from fitspiration-tagged images.

 Data collection
Taiminen [87] Facebook web-based forum Finland UNK UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • Active participants in the web-based community showed a more positive perception of achieving their goals, followed instructions more precisely, and perceived to receive more emotional support than participants who are not active in the web-based community.

 Intervention pathway
Hales et al [88] Social PODb United States Overweight adults UNK (intervention study) Social support

  • The experiment group using a weight-loss mobile app lost significantly more weight than the comparison group.

 Intervention pathway
Meitz et al [70] Facebook Germany Children UNK (intervention study) Source credibility

  • In a web-based media-embedded health campaign against childhood obesity, the following were noted: (1) participant’s self-relevance varies based on different source credibility perceptions and (2) provocative messages in the campaign may result in negative persuasion effects.

 Intervention pathway
Ghaznavi and Taylor [73] Twitter and Pinterest UNK UNK 300 images Social movements

  • The study suggests thinspiration content promotes an objectified, sexual, extremely thin depiction of the thin ideal. Exposure to these contents has the potential harmful effects.

 Data collection
Appleton et al [89] Web-based forums Australia UNK 34 discussion threads Social support

  • Four major themes were detected in parents’ web-based discussion forums about children obesity: seeking advice, sharing advice, social support, and making a judgment.

 Data collection
Karami et al [63] Twitter United States UNK 4.5 million tweets Social movement

  • Exercise and obesity, diabetes and obesity, diet, and obesity have a strong correlation with each other. The strongest correlation was found between exercise and obesity.

 Data collection
Swindle et al [71] Facebook United States Parents UNK (intervention study) School environment

  • Facebook is a feasible platform to provide nutrition education and facilitate parent’s engagement.

 Intervention pathway
De Brún et al [5] Web-based message boards Ireland UNK 2872 obesity-relevant comments Stigma

  • The study analyzed obesity-related comments from multi-topic web-based message boards and determined that obesity stigma is pervasive, and the discussion of the issue is highly acceptable.

 Data collection
Gregg et al [76] Web-based forums United Kingdom UNK 1704 comments Policy

  • The study analyzed associated comments to the United Kingdom government about childhood obesity strategy and determined the comments are largely negative.

 Data collection
Atanasova [90] Blogs United Kingdom UNK 343 posts from 6 obesity blogs Social support

  • The content of blogs highlighted the conclusion that there are no one-size-fits-all solutions to obesity that work for everyone.

 Data collection
Cohen et al [55] Instagram UNK UNK 630 posts Social movements

  • Body-positive posts depicted a broad range of body sizes and appearances.

 Data collection

aUNK: unknown.

bPOD: social pounds off digitally.

cPCOS: polycystic ovary syndrome.