Background: The emergence of social media has revolutionized the discourse surrounding body image, particularly through trends like fitspiration and body positivity. While fitspiration often emphasizes physical appearance and restrictive behaviors, the trend of body positivity emerged to challenge societal ideals and promote acceptance. However, there are controversies as to whether the trend of body positivity has delivered its promise. Despite extensive research, direct comparisons between these trends on platforms like YouTube remain scarce. This study addresses this gap by analyzing fitspiration and body positivity content and comments on YouTube. This study aims to provide insights into various aspects of fitspiration and body positivity content on YouTube, including their popularity, content themes, and sentiment in comments.

Data: This study gathered textual data, including video titles, descriptions, user-defined content tags, and comments, as well as contextual data such as video view count, comment count, duration, and category, from the most viewed fitspiration and body positivity YouTube videos using the YouTube API. The data covered videos published between 2013 and 2023, with the 11-year period divided into equal half-year windows. The videos were sampled using the keywords “fitspo” and “fitspiration” for fitspiration samples, and “bodypositive” and “bodypositivity” for body positivity samples, within specified half-year time windows. In total, 1045 fitspiration videos and 752 body positivity videos were analyzed, along with 7997 fitspiration comments and 13776 body positivity comments.

Methods: The study employed a mixed-methods approach to analyze various aspects of video content and comments on YouTube. For popularity and duration comparison, descriptive analysis was conducted on sample volume, view count, comment count, and video duration. This involved examining the overall distribution and trends of these variables across different years and topics. For video topic comparisons, the distribution of video categories and frequently used hashtags was examined to understand the types of content and trends within each topic. Additionally, cluster analysis was performed to evaluate cohesion within each trend and distinction between trends. For comment analysis, pre- trained Large Language Models (LLMs) were deployed to analyze the sentiment of comments and used to identify prominent themes present in the comments, shedding light on the topics and sentiments expressed by viewers.

Results: Popularity and Duration Comparison: The number of body positivity videos published on YouTube steadily increased from 2013 to 2019. On average, body positivity videos garnered higher view counts, comment counts, and likes compared to fitspiration videos. In the recent three years (2021 to 2023), body positivity videos reached their highest average view count and comment count over the 11-year period. Conversely, fitspiration videos exhibited a more stable trend in average view count with no noticeable overall growth. Topic Comparison: The “People & Blogs” category emerged as the most prominent video category for both topics. However, the most notable contrast was observed in the “Sport” category, which constituted over 23% of fitspiration videos but less than 2% of body positivity videos. Sentiment Comparison of Comments: The majority of comments under both fitspiration and body positivity videos exhibited positive sentiments. However, body positivity videos had a higher proportion of negative comments. Themes Comparison of Comments: The majority of comments across both topics were found to have the prominent theme of Gratitude or Appreciation for Content, followed by Physical Appearance or Body Shape/Parts. Physical Appearance or Body Shape/Parts comments were less positive and more negative than average in sentiment; they tend to be more negative in body positivity than fitspiration. Body Functionality emerged as the third most common prominent theme in fitspiration comments, but was only marginal in body positivity comments. The body positivity constructs Conceptualize Beauty Broadly and Encouragement of Body Acceptance were more frequently found in body positivity comments than fitspiration ones. However, half of Conceptualize Beauty Broadly comments in body positivity were negative. Personal life story sharing was the third most frequent theme in body positivity; however, it was also the most negative theme across the ten themes.

Conclusions: Body positivity videos on YouTube have surged in popularity in recent years, peaking between 2021 and 2023, while fitspiration videos have shown more stable viewership trends. A key difference between the two trends is the emphasis on body positivity versus physical exercise. However, it’s noteworthy that a significant portion of body positivity comments exhibit negative sentiment, particularly those focusing on Conceptualizing Beauty Broadly. Surprisingly, body positivity content often centers more on physical appearance than fitspiration content. This emphasis on appearance correlates with higher rates of negative sentiment in body positivity comments. Additionally, personal life story sharing is prevalent in body positivity discussions, with a notable proportion reflecting negative experiences. These findings highlight concerns about body positivity discourse online and suggest avenues for further research, particularly in understanding the impact of these interactions on viewers.