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Exploring How Youth Use TikTok for Mental Health Information in British Columbia: Semistructured Interview Study With Youth.

Roxanne TurubaWillow CormierRae ZimmermanNikki OwMarco Antonio ZenoneYuri QuintanaEmily K JenkinsShelly Ben-DavidAlicia RaimundoAlessandro R MarconSteve MathiasJoanna Lyn HendersonSkye Pamela Barbic
Published in: JMIR infodemiology (2024)
Findings suggest that TikTok can be a useful tool to increase mental health awareness, reduce stigma, and encourage youth to learn and address their mental health challenges while providing a source of peer connection and support. Simultaneously, TikTok can adversely impact mental health through repetitive exposure to mentally distressing content and misleading diagnosis and treatment information. Regulations against harmful content are needed to mitigate these risks and make TikTok safer for youth. Efforts should also be made to increase media and health literacy among youth so that they can better assess the information they consume online.
Keyphrases
  • mental health
  • health information
  • mental illness
  • social media
  • healthcare
  • physical activity
  • young adults
  • high frequency
  • risk assessment
  • climate change