By Taylor Berenbaum, health and wellness reporter
For young adults, fitness advice is no longer limited to the gym floor. TikTok and Instagram feeds are helping shape what students eat, how they work out and what they believe it takes to get fit.
Social media serves as an accessible tool for finding motivation, community and information about exercise. However, the same feeds that introduce students to new workouts can also blur the line between evidence-based advice, personal experience, marketing and misinformation.
For Owyn Dawyot, a recent Virginia Tech graduate and fitness content creator, creating fitness content means navigating a constant tension between what he wants to make and what the algorithm wants people to watch.
Short-form platforms reward quick, visually engaging content, and creators often find themselves replicating videos that have already performed well. The pressure to chase views can make it easy to lose sight of why a creator started making content in the first place.
“Some of my favorite videos are the ones that perform the worst,” said Dawyot.
As Dawyot explained, this distinction is part of what makes fitness content difficult to evaluate: Popularity can tell viewers what is getting attention, but not necessarily whether the information is accurate or useful.
There is an additional layer to that polished version of fitness. Social media often shows viewers the parts of people’s lives they want others to see.
Dawyot describes social media as “the highlight reel of everyone’s lives.”
That highlight reel can be especially noticeable in fitness content, where workouts, physiques and transformations are highly visual and typically perform well in the realm of views and engagement. Viewers may see the result without seeing the time, effort or circumstances behind it.
That is part of why fitness advice can be difficult to apply from one person to another.
“Just because someone shares what has worked for them doesn’t mean that it’s going to work for everyone,” said Dawyot.
That distinction matters when students use social media as a source of health and fitness information.
Research suggests the challenge is more than just navigating different opinions online. A 2025 systematic review of 33 studies examining physical activity misinformation on social media found misinformation across topics including exercise recommendations, weight loss and general physical activity.
Stella Volpe, a professor and head of Virginia Tech’s Department of Human Nutrition, Foods and Exercise, sees that distinction from an evidence-based perspective.
“We know that there’s such beauty to social media, but then there’s such bad to social media,” said Volpe.
Students may see an influencer who looks fit and assume that person has the expertise to explain how others should exercise or eat. But appearance and popularity do not necessarily establish expertise. Volpe noted that some influencers may promote practices that “may or may not be right.”
The difference between personal experience and evidence becomes especially important when social media advice involves nutrition or weight loss. Protein and supplements can fall into this category.
“Don’t just read the bottle and believe any claims you might see on social media, because not all of those claims are true,” said Volpe.
The same distinction matters as trending conversations about weight loss, including GLP-1 medications, continue to circulate online.
For students, figuring out what information to trust does not mean avoiding social media altogether.
Social media can be a useful tool for finding health and fitness information, but Volpe emphasized that it should not be the final source for health and fitness decisions, encouraging students to look to credible sources, including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Try your very best to go to the science first, not to social media,” said Volpe.
Even research can be misinterpreted or taken out of context, making it important for students to consider where information comes from rather than relying on a single post or video.
The issue extends beyond whether a workout or nutrition claim is technically accurate. Fitness content can also shape what students think their bodies and progress are supposed to look like.
Volpe discussed how students may see someone online showcasing their physique and assume that person achieved it in a matter of weeks. Comparing that image with their own progress can leave students feeling discouraged about both exercise and their appearance.
Volpe mentioned the importance of students focusing on their own progress rather than using people they see online as a measurement for where they should be.
“You can be fit at any weight; there is good research on that,” said Volpe.
For college students and young adults scrolling through fitness content, social media can still be a place to find new workout splits, inspiration and a community of like-minded users. But the most visible video is not necessarily the most valuable, and the most confident voice is not necessarily the most informed.
Dawyot’s experience as a creator points to one side of that equation: What performs well online is not always what holds the most value. Volpe’s advice points to the other: What appears convincing online is not necessarily what the evidence supports.
For students and young adults trying to figure out what fitness looks like for them, navigating social media may mean knowing when to take inspiration from the screen and when to look beyond it.
Editor’s note: Owyn Dawyot is a graduate of the Virginia Tech School of Communication which produces The News Feed NRV. Owyn is a former reporter for The News Feed NRV.
