New research from The Kids Research Institute Australia has found that TikTok can be a safe online space for transgender and gender diverse people seeking support.
The research observed that the trans and gender diverse (‘trans’) community principally uses TikTok as a form of community connection, to engage in discourse about trans identities and politics, and to recount experiences of social adversity.
Lead author Rigel Paciente said the study continued to build on evidence that online spaces were important avenues of social support for marginalised groups and communities.
“We know that trans people experience adverse mental health outcomes at a higher rate than the general population but connection with community can help alleviate that,” Paciente said.
“So, it is really pleasing to see that trans people have formed a community on TikTok that validates and affirms their identities and experiences. Especially considering global challenges that trans people continue to face.”
“Building on top of our previous investigation of LGBTQIA+ TikTok, the next step would be to investigate the impact of TikTok content on LGBTQIA+ young people using the app, as has previously been done with other forms of social media.”
TikTok’s algorithm functions as a positive feedback loop, ensuring users are more likely to see
content they regularly engage with appear on their ‘For You’ page. For this reason, a TikTok account was created with a ‘For You’ page curated to trans-related content, and data was then collected from the top 150 videos that appeared on this page.
The analysis generated three main categories: community connection, engaging in discourse, and recounting experiences of social adversity. Findings from this project were recently published in the International Journal of Transgender Health.
The study stemmed from a small internal grant to a group of 19 early career researchers, spread across 12 teams, who joined forced to create a protocol to ensure content analysis across TikTok followed a consistent approach.
t also builds on 2023 Embrace research which revealed that TikTok is used by LGBTQIA+ people to foster a sense of community and explore self-identity.
The project was led by Embrace and Healing Kids, Healing Families researchers at The Kids Research Institute Australia.
Source: Media Release.
