Social media provides a new platform for the public, patients, and health professionals to communicate about health and illness and potentially improve health outcomes. One specific type of social media influencers extensively shares their experiences with health, fitness, and illness with their followers through autobiographic videos or posts.

Autobiographical accounts on social media could play an essential role in shaping the public’s understanding of illnesses and dispelling illness-related stigma.

In this study, we examined how people living with depression describe their illness experiences on Douyin, China’s leading video-sharing platform. Here are some of the main findings:

• Most videos were created by young women who have lived with the illness for over three years.
• The top three topics were patient psychology, experience sharing, and knowledge and medical advice.
• These videos provided an overall non-stigmatizing portrayal of depression, with more than 80% of the influencers using challenge cues.
• However, stigma cues contributed to the virality of the videos. In other words, highly negative videos adopting stereotyping descriptions of depression are more likely to generate more likes and comments.

Li, J., Tang, L., & Pu, Y. (2023). My story of depression: A content analysis of autobiographic videos on Douyin. Health Communication. DOI: 10.1080/10410236.2023.2191887 [Full text]