Half of popular TikToks about “food noise” mention medications, mainly weight-loss drugs, to manage intrusive thoughts about food

(Press-News.org) A new analysis being presented at this year’s European Congress on Obesity (ECO) in Malaga, Spain (11-14 May), finds that around half of the 100 top TikTok videos about food noise reference the use of medications—mainly the popular anti-obesity drugs glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RAs)—to manage constant and persistent thoughts about food and eating. 

“TikTok can be an incredible tool for raising awareness, but it also has a downside,” said lead author Daisuke Hayashi from the Pennsylvania State University, USA.

“The abundance of content depicting anti-obesity medications as a solution for food noise is a double-edged sword. On one hand, content creators seem to have found a community in TikTok where they can share their lived experiences about food noise, and how new medications have helped them change their health behaviours and fight intrusive thoughts about food. On the other hand, younger audiences, who make the most of TikTok’s viewership, may not understand the distinction between food noise and normal hunger and appetite. This could negatively affect their relationship with food and make them believe that they need a medication to silence normal food cravings.”

Food noise has recently emerged in media, social media, and reports from patients and clinicians to describe rumination and obsessive preoccupation about food and eating. A theoretical definition of food noise has recently been established by Hayashi and colleagues as “heightened and/or persistent manifestations of food cue reactivity, often leading to food-related intrusive thoughts and maladaptive eating behaviours” [1].

Google Trends data reveal that interest in food noise started in 2023, with an all-time high in April 2025, coinciding with the surge in popularity of anti-obesity drugs such as semaglutide (Ozempic and Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Mounjaro and Zepbound).

Over one billion users—mostly children, teenagers, and young adults—use the online short video-sharing platform TikTok, which has become a major outlet for content creators to disseminate information on food noise, with over 3,600 videos under the hashtag #FoodNoise as of June 2024.

While these platforms have powerful potential to benefit users interested in such content, they may also help to spread misinformation. However, little is known about the content encountered by social media users around food noise.

To find out more, researchers assessed the content of the 100 top TikTok videos under the hashtag #FoodNoise retrieved on June 24th, 2024 (one duplicate video was removed).

They found that the sampled videos had an average of 1,173,324 views, 8,155 likes, 247 comments, and 583 shares. Of the videos that defined food noise (83%), almost all (94%) aligned with the current theoretical definition.

The content creators were mostly female (92%), aged 30 or older (82%), and White (86%). Notably, 1 in 5 content creators were healthcare professionals, and almost three-quarters (71%) of videos were patient testimonies.

The analysis also found that most videos (86%) depicted food noise as a negative phenomenon that causes suffering and loss of quality of life. Half of the videos mentioned medications, and often mentioned the use of drugs to manage food noise, with 92% related to GLP-1RA drugs like semaglutide and tirzepatide.

Additionally, sponsored content was disclosed in just 5% of videos. “Undisclosed sponsorship is believed to be abundant on TikTok. Some content may be posted by creators promoting products and treatments without proper disclosure, and people watching these videos may not even know they are being advertised to,” said Hayashi.He added, “Future research is needed to explore lived experiences around food noise beyond online platforms to understand more about this phenomenon, how to manage it, and how it might impact eating behaviours, health, and quality of life.”

 

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