Promotion of Tanning Behaviors on Instagram: Content Analysis

Abstract Background Adolescents and young adults may be particularly susceptible to social media content that promotes tanning and appearance-based beauty standards. Objective This study examined the characteristics and messaging of pro- and antitanning Instagram posts and the extent to which they promoted health damaging– or health enhancing–behaviors. Methods A cross-sectional content analysis of 100 Instagram posts using the hashtag #tanning assessed creator characteristics, tanning practices, commercial promotion, tanning-related messaging, beauty standards, and health risks and benefits. χ 2 and Fisher exact tests were used to determine differences between pro vs anti stances for categorical and dichotomous variables, and the Mann-Whitney U test was used for continuous variables. Results Most videos were protanning (79/100). Protanning videos were significantly greater than antitanning videos to have been posted in 2026 (77.2% vs 47.6%; P =.02), feature teen and young adult creators (87.3% vs 52.4%; P <.001), and include shopping tags promoting tanning products (30.4% vs 0%; P <.001). Overall, messaging focused on promoting tanning (76%) and advocating for tanned skin as a standard of beauty (63%) and downplayed the use of sun protection (11%) and the risks associated with tanning (20%). Messaging varied significantly by tanning stance, with antitanning videos focused on sun protection and health risk. Conclusions Findings indicate an urgent need for clinicians to lead content creation on popular social media platforms to counter the health-damaging effects of unreliable, incomplete, and potentially misdirected information that is posted under popularized hashtags.