Apps like My Fitness Pal could be putting your mental health at risk

The multi-billion dollar health and fitness app industry is booming, while users risk developing disorders in the pursuit of health and wellness.

Most of us are probably aware of apps like My Fitness Pal, Lose It, and even the oddly named Fat Secret app that can be used as a tool to improve health and facilitate weight loss.

The weight loss, diet, and fitness app industry is booming and continues to grow, generating billions of dollars and recruiting hundreds of millions of users.

In 2023, over 311 million people reportedly used health and fitness apps to take control of their physical health.

According to Business of Apps, these apps were downloaded 379 million times in 2023.

While many apps allow users to maintain or even gain weight as an option, they’re more commonly known by consumers as a weight loss tool.

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undefined MyFitnessPal (@MyFitnessPal) November 2, 2023

There’s evidence that health and fitness apps have helped users improve their physical health, a recent study suggests that they could also negatively impact users by promoting obsessive eating habits and eating disorder symptoms.

Researchers from Flinders University in Australia reviewed 38 studies that looked into the connection between the use of diet and fitness apps and the development of eating disorder symptoms.

The review found that the apps, by design, may harm users, “particularly those that may be at higher risk of developing harmful behaviors related to body images, eating, and/or exercise.”

Researchers said that the design of many health and fitness apps could harm users in the long run, as they could become obsessed with the app's weight-loss goal and calorie recommendations.

While these calorie recommendations and weight-loss goals are usually set based on individual metrics, the culture surrounding health-tracking apps and calorie counters has the potential to become toxic.

Furthermore, those who have the tendency to become obsessed with weight loss, the amount of calories they need to lose weight, or already have a poor relationship with their body image may use apps like these to further reinforce their behaviors.

Another set of researchers studied My Fitness Pal, one of the most popular diet and fitness-tracking apps in the world, and later reviewed it by Flinders University researchers.

The study recruited 105 people from an eating disorder clinic, in which 74% of participants said they had used My Fitness Pal to track their calories.

Out of those who had used the calorie tracker, 73% of people said that it had somewhat contributed to their eating disorder, and roughly 63% said that it had moderately contributed to their disorder.

The study found that 30% of people believed that My Fitness Pal was a significant contributing factor when it came to developing an eating disorder.