VentTok: Exploring the mental health narrative on TikTok.

TikTok is a hugely popular social media platform that has become an important space for individuals, especially youth, to express their attitudes and feelings toward issues. This study seeks to understand the narrative surrounding mental health and illness on TikTok, including the proportion of stigmatizing or trivializing content. A content analysis was performed on a sample of 400 TikTok posts collected via #mentalhealth and #mentalillness over a 15-day period. The posts were coded for type of content and emotional expression, as well as subtypes of stigmatization and trivialization. Linguistic analysis was performed on the 10 most “liked” comments from each post. Of the 400 posts, the majority described a personal experience of mental ill-health (n = 297, 74.25%), 29.25% (n = 117) were supportive of those with mental ill-health, and 34.50% (n = 138) intended to raise awareness. However, the most prominent emotional expression was one of sadness, loneliness, or despair (n = 164, 41.00%). A portion of posts included content describing a lived experience of stigma (n = 42, 10.50%) or trivialization (n = 25, 6.25%), while 11.50% (n = 46) and 12.50% (n = 50) of posts contained stigmatizing and trivializing content, respectively. These results suggest TikTok is primarily a space used to share feelings and experiences surrounding mental health and illness. Yet, the potential impacts on those living with mental ill-health remain unclear. Future research should therefore seek to deepen our understanding of the ways in which social media narratives impact the lived experience of mental ill-health.