Analysing the Effects of Social Media Influencers’ Food-related Posts on Healthy Eating Intentions, Orthorectic Eating Tendencies, Product Attitudes, and Purchase Intentions

Abstract

Food-related social media posts, often with branded content, distributed by popular social media influencers, have started to catch the attention of many social media users. The impacts of these posts and marketing efforts on users, not only on purchase behaviour, but especially on healthy eating intentions and orthorectic eating tendencies are still under researched. Orthorectic eating tendencies are becoming increasingly more prevalent and characterize potentially disordered eating behaviours with a (too) strong focus on food quality. We conducted an online survey among a German-speaking sample of young adults (18-30 years) and Instagram users, exposing participants (N=251) to food-related Instagram posts, to investigate these effects. The results suggested that especially those food-related social media posts, which triggered higher emotional arousal had a positive impact on attitudes towards the advertised product and purchase intentions. Worryingly, a higher emotional arousal also contributed to higher (problematic) orthorectic eating tendencies. Posts that were perceived as more credible contributed to higher healthy eating intentions. We outline important implications of our results for influencers, social media users, and marketers.