Creative Research

The Negative Impact of Heavy TikTok Use in Adolescence and How This Data May Be Presented Via a Creative Output

TikTok, the most popular app in the world with over 1 billion users (Brandon, D, 2022), 25% of which are aged 10-19 (Sheppard, 2022)

It would be naive to suggest that this app does not have some influence on the adolescents that consume its fast-paced content. Within this age range, adolescents (World health organisation, 2022) minds are taking shape, both figuratively and literally (Blakemore, 2012)

Looking into a study titled: ‘Research on Adolescents Regarding the Indirect Effect of Depression, Anxiety, and Stress between TikTok Use Disorder and Memory Loss’, this study test effects of TikTok usage in adolescence, and find that heavy TikTok usage (defined as TTUD) is positively linked to depression, anxiety, stress, and memory loss.

Figure 1: Structural model of forward digit span test for male and female participants. TTUD, TikTok use disorder; DSF, forward digit span.

How might this research be presented through creative means?

To my knowledge this study does not have a creative output, however, I have an idea of how it could.

This study’s results could be presented as a fictional short film. Due to the emotional nature of the study results (stress, depression, anxiety, and memory loss), the film would likely be relatable and emotionally engaging to a large group of people. Furthermore, TikTok is an immensely popular app with 1 billion monthly active users (Dean, B., 2022), it is possible that many of these users may have a TikTok use disorder themselves, and are directly affected by what this study outlines.

A short film would help a large number of people understand the effects of heavy TikTok usage in a more emotionally driven and easy-to-understand way. Scientific text based data such as the data presented in this study Is informative, but it does not elicit an emotional or sympathetic response in the same way video could (Yadav et.al, 2011). Video is the most engaging method for conveying information across the internet (Wyzowl, 2022).

The Story of the Film

The film will follow a young male student (let’s call him Kyle for explanation’s sake), male because the study suggests that males have more depression, anxiety, stress, and memory loss as a result of TTUD compared to female students.

Initially, Kyle is on top of all his work and social responsibilities, but after downloading and using TikTok, he begins to struggle to keep up with his university assignments and slowly falls into antisocial behaviour caused by TikTok-induced depression, anxiety, stress, and memory loss.

At the end of this film, Kyle puts down his phone and his life begins to turn back to normal, as it was at the start of the film.

Figure 2: Kyle happy and on top of things (Source: Cottonbro Studio, 2022)

Figure 3: Kyle after TikTok induced depression, anxiety, stress, and memory loss (Source: Cottonbro Studio, 2022)

Does considering a creative output help me understand the research differently?

When coming up with this shot film idea, It helped me empathise with the people who are heavily affected by TTUD. It is one thing to see the data on a table, it is another to get inside the mind of an affected individual as I did when creating Kyles’s story. The emotions I felt when considering the task and writing Kyle’s story are exactly what I would like the short film to convey: empathy for the affected individuals, and better, more emotionally driven awareness of the negative effects caused by heavy TikTok consumption.

References

Blakemore, S. (2012). Imaging brain development: The adolescent brain. NeuroImage, pp. 397–406. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.11.080

Brandon, D. (2022, November 20). TikTok Statistics. Wallaroo. https://wallaroomedia.com/blog/social-media/tiktok-statistics/

Cottonbro Studio. (2020). Man in Black Hoodie Sitting on Brown Couch. [Photograph] https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-in-black-hoodie-sitting-on-brown-couch-4100420/

Cottonbro Studio (2020). Man in Black Sweater Sitting on Brown Wooden Chair. [Photograph]. https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-in-black-sweater-sitting-on-brown-wooden-chair-4100669/

Dean, B. (2022). TikTok User Statistics (2022). Backlinko. https://backlinko.com/tiktok-users

Sha, P., & Dong, X. (2021). Research on Adolescents Regarding the Indirect Effect of Depression, Anxiety, and Stress between TikTok Use Disorder and Memory Loss. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. pp. 1-9. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18168820

Sheppard, J. (2022, October 05). 20 Essential TikTok Statistics You Need to Know in 2022. Social Shepherd. https://thesocialshepherd.com/blog/tiktok-statistics

World Health Organization. (2022). Adolescent Health. World Health Organization. https://www.who.int/health-topics/adolescent-health#tab=tab_1

Wyzowl. (2022). The State of Video Marketing 2022. Wyzowl. https://wyzowl.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/pdfs/Wyzowl-Video-Survey-2022.pdf.

Yadav, A., Phillips, M. M., Lundeberg, M. A., Koehler, M. J., Hilden, K., Dirkin, K. H. (2011). If a picture is worth a thousand words is video worth a million? Differences in affective and cognitive processing of video and text cases. Journal of Computing in Higher Education. pp. 15–37. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12528-011-9042-y