qualitative research title about tiktok

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On the Psychology of TikTok Use: A First Glimpse From Empirical Findings

Christian montag.

1 Department of Molecular Psychology, Institute of Psychology and Education, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany

2 The Clinical Hospital of Chengdu Brain Science Institute, MOE Key Lab for Neuroinformation, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China

3 Faculty of Psychology, Tianjin Normal University, Academy of Psychology and Behavior, Tianjin, China

Jon D. Elhai

4 Department of Psychology, University of Toledo, Toledo, OH, United States

5 Department of Psychiatry, University of Toledo, Toledo, OH, United States

TikTok (in Chinese: DouYin; formerly known as musical.ly) currently represents one of the most successful Chinese social media applications in the world. Since its founding in September 2016, TikTok has seen widespread distribution, in particular, attracting young users to engage in viewing, creating, and commenting on “LipSync-Videos” on the app. Despite its success in terms of user numbers, psychological studies aiming at an understanding of TikTok use are scarce. This narrative review provides a comprehensive overview on the small empirical literature available thus far. In particular, insights from uses and gratification theory in the realm of TikTok are highlighted, and we also discuss aspects of the TikTok platform design. Given the many unexplored research questions related to TikTok use, it is high time to strengthen research efforts to better understand TikTok use and whether certain aspects of its use result in detrimental behavioral effects. In light of user characteristics of the TikTok platform, this research is highly relevant because TikTok users are often adolescents and therefore from a group of potentially vulnerable individuals.

Musical.ly was founded in September 2016 by Zhang Yiming. Beijing Bytedance Technology acquired the application musical.ly in November 2017 and renamed the app to TikTok. In a short time period, this application became the most successful app from Chinese origin in terms of global distribution ( 1 ). As of November 2020, 800 million monthly users have been reported 1 , and 738 million first-time installs in 2019 have been estimated 2 . TikTok use is allowed for those 13 years or older, but direct messaging between users is allowed only for those 16 or older (in order to protect young users from grooming) 3 . In China, the main users of TikTok are under 35 years old (81.68% (2)). Meanwhile, to protect children and adolescents from unsuitable content (such as smoking, drinking, or rude language), TikTok's engineers also developed a version of the app, which filters inappropriate content for young users ( 2 ). Of note, at the moment of writing, the app operates as TikTok on the global market and as DouYin on the Chinese market ( 3 ). Similarities and differences of the twin apps are further described with a content analysis by Sun et al. ( 4 ).

The TikTok application available for Android and Apple smartphones enables creation of short videos where users can perform playback-videos to diverse pop-songs, to name one very prominent feature of the platform. These so-called “LipSync-Videos” can be shared with other users, downloaded for non-commercial purposes, commented upon and of course attached with a “Like.” Not only are playback-videos uploaded on TikTok but also users view a large amount of video content. Users can also call out for “challenges,” where they define which performance should be created by many users. As a consequence, TikTok users imitate the content or interact with the original video.

As the large user numbers in a very short time-window demonstrate, TikTok not only represents a global phenomenon but also has been criticized with respect to data protection issues/privacy ( 5 , 6 ), spreading hate ( 7 ) and might serve as a platform engendering cyberbullying ( 8 , 9 ). Given the many young users of this platform (e.g., 81.68% of China users of Tiktok are under 35 years old—see above, and 32.5% of the US users are 19 years old and younger) 4 , it is of particular relevance to better understand the motivation to use TikTok, alongside related topics. Such an understanding might also be relevant because recent research suggests that TikTok can be a potent channel to inform young persons on health-relevant information ( 10 – 12 ), on official information release from the government ( 13 ), political discussions ( 14 ), tourism content ( 15 ), live online sales ( 16 ), and even educational content ( 17 ). There even have been video-posts analyzed in a scientific paper related to radiology ( 18 ). Clearly, young TikTok users are also confronted with harmful health content, including smoking of e-cigarettes ( 19 ). Moreover, the health information learned from TikTok videos often does not meet necessary standards—as is discussed in a paper on acne ( 20 ). Finally, there arises the problem that while creating content, children's/adolescent's private home bedrooms from which they create TikTok videos become visible to the world, posing privacy intrusions ( 21 ). The many obviously negative aspects of TikTok use are in itself important further research leads. From a psychological perspective, we take a different path with the present review and try to better understand why people use TikTok, who uses the platform, and also how people use TikTok.

Why do People Use TikTok?

This question can be answered from different perspectives. One perspective providing an initial answer and—likely being true for most social media services—has been put forward by Montag and Hegelich ( 22 ). Social media companies have created services being highly immersive, aiming to capture the attention of users as long as possible ( 23 ). As a result of a prolonged user stay, social media companies obtain deep insights into psychological features of their users ( 24 ), which can be used for microtargeting purposes ( 25 ). Such immersive platform design also likely drives users with certain characteristics into problematic social media use ( 26 ) or problematic TikTok use (addictive-like behavior), but this aspect relating to TikTok use is understudied. Nevertheless, reinforcement of TikTok usage is also very likely reached by design-elements such as “Likes” ( 27 ), personalized and endless content available ( 23 ). TikTok's “For You”-Page (the landing page) learns quickly via artificial intelligence what users like, which likely results in longer TikTok use than a user intended, which may cause smartphone TikTok-related addictive behavior ( 2 ). This said, these ideas put forward still need to be confirmed by empirical studies dealing exclusively with TikTok. In this realm, an interesting research piece recently investigated less studied variables such as first-person camera views, but also humor on key variables such as immersion and entertainment on the TikTok platform ( 28 ), again all of relevance to prolong user stay.

The other perspective one could choose to address why people use TikTok stems from uses and gratification theory ( 29 , 30 ). The simple idea of this highly influential theory is that use of certain media can result in gratification of a person's needs ( 30 ), and only if relevant needs of a person are gratified by particular media, users will continue media use—here digital platform or social media use.

A recent paper by Bucknell Bossen and Kottasz ( 31 ) provided insight that, in particular, gratification of entertainment/affective needs was the most relevant driver to understand a range of behaviors on TikTok, including passive consumption of content, but also creating content and interacting with others. In particular, the authors summarized that TikTok participation was motivated by needs to expand one's social network, seek fame, and express oneself creatively. Recent work by Omar and Dequan ( 32 ) also applied uses and gratification theory to better understand TikTok use. In their work, especially the need for escapism predicted TikTok content consumption, whereas self-expression was linked to both participating and producing behavior. A study by Shao and Lee ( 33 ) not only applied uses and gratification theory to understand TikTok use but also shed light on TikTok use satisfaction and the intention to further use TikTok. In line with findings from the already mentioned works, entertainment/information alongside communication and self-expression were discussed as relevant use motives (needs to be satisfied by TikTok use). Satisfaction with TikTok was investigated as a mediator between different motives to use TikTok and to continue TikTok use. We also mention recent work being unable to link TikTok use to well-being, whether in a positive or negative way ( 34 ). Finally, Wang et al. ( 35 ) underlined the overall relevance of uses and gratification theory to understand TikTok use and presented need variables in cognitive and affective domains as relevant to study, but also personal/social integration and relief of pressure. In this context, we also mention the view of Shao ( 2 ) who put forward that, in particular, young people use TikTok for positioning oneself in their peer group and to understand where he/she stands in the peer group. Thus, TikTok is also relevant for identity formation of young persons and obtaining feedback to oneself.

Further theories need to be mentioned, which can explain why people are using the TikTok platform: Social Impact Theory and Self-Determination Theory. To our knowledge, these theories have not been sufficiently addressed empirically so far with respect to TikTok use, but are well known to be of relevance to understand social media use in general and are therefore mentioned.

Clearly, an important driver of social media use can be power, hence, reaching out to many and influencing other persons ( 36 ). Here, the classic Social Impact Theory (SIT) by Latané ( 37 ) tries to understand how to best measure the impact of people on a single individual/individuals. This theory—originating in the pre-social-media-age—gained a lot of visibility with the rise of social media services because, in particular, in the age of filter bubbles, fake news, and misinformation campaigns ( 38 , 39 ), it is interesting to understand how individual users on social media are socially influenced by others, for instance, in the area of their (political) attitudes. The SIT postulates three highly relevant factors called strength, immediacy, and number (of sources) to predict such a social impact. Ultimately, applying this theory to better understand TikTok use also needs to take into account that users differ in terms of their active and passive use.

The Self-Determination Theory (SDT) has been proposed by Ryan and Deci ( 40 ) and belongs to the most influential motivation theories of human behavior. Hence, it clearly can also be used to explain why people are motivated to use a social media service ( 41 , 42 ). According to SDT, motivated behavior (here using TikTok) should be high, when such a platform enables users to feel competence, autonomy, and being connected with others. Design of the platform can help to trigger related psychological states (e.g., push notifications can trigger fear of missing out, hence, not being connected to significant others) ( 43 ); but clearly also, individual differences play a relevant role, and this should be discussed as the next important area in this work. As with the SIT, applying SDT to better understand TikTok use will also need to take into account different kinds of TikTok use. A sense of self-determination might rise to different levels, when users are actively or passively using TikTok—and this also represents an interesting research question.

Who Uses TikTok and Who Does Not?

The aforementioned statistics show that TikTok users are often young. Bucknell Bossen and Kottasz ( 31 ) illustrated that, in particular, young users are also those who seem to be particularly active on the platform, and thus share much information. Given that, in particular, young users often do not foresee consequences of self-disclosure, it is of high importance to better protect this vulnerable group from detrimental aspects of social media use. Beyond age, statistics suggest that more females than males use the platform 5 , something also observed with other platforms ( 44 – 46 ). First, insights from personality psychology provided further information on associations between characteristics of TikTok users and how they use it (see also the next How Do People Use TikTok? section): The widely applied Big Five Personality traits called openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism (acronym OCEAN) were all robustly linked to producing, participating, and consuming behavior on TikTok, with the exception of agreeableness only being linked to consuming behavior ( 32 ). Using a hierarchical regression model inserting both personality variables and motives from uses and gratification theory, it became apparent that the latter variables seemed to outweigh the personality variables in their importance to predict TikTok usage. Lu et al. ( 47 ) used data from China to investigate individual differences in DouYin (again the Chinese version of TikTok) use. Among others, they observed that people refraining from using DouYin did so out of fear of getting “addicted” to the application [see also ( 48 )]. This needs to be further systematically explored with the Big Five model of personality (or HEXACO, as the personality models dominating modern personality psychology at the moment). Without doubt, it will be also highly important to better understand how the variables of socio-demographics and personality interact on TikTok use, also in the realm of active/passive use of the platform. Active use would describe a high engagement toward the platform including commenting and uploading videos. Passive usage would reflect in browsing and simply consuming videos. The need to distinguish between active and passive use of social media has been also recently empirically supported by Peterka-Bonetta et al. ( 49 ).

How do People Use TikTok?

In the Why Do People Use TikTok? section, we already mentioned that users can passively view content, but also create content or interact with others. Studies comprehensively showing how many and which types of people use TikTok with respect to these behavioral categories are lacking (but TikTok likely has at least some of these insights). A recent review by Kross et al. ( 50 ) on “social media (use) and well-being” summarized that several psychological processes such as upward social comparison (perhaps also happening in so-called “challenges” on TikTok) or fear of missing out ( 43 ) are related to negative affect and might have detrimental effects on the usage experience and/or TikTok users' lives in general. Overall, the psychological impact of the TikTok platform might also be very likely, in particular, when adolescents often imitate their idols in “LipSync-Videos” ( 51 ). The kind of influence of such behavior on the development of one's own identity and self-esteem (self-confidence) ( 52 ) will be a matter of important psychological discussion, but it is too early to speculate further on potential psychological effects here, both in the positive or negative direction ( 53 ). Moreover, whether such effects will be of positive or negative nature, we mention the importance to not overpathologize everyday life behavior ( 54 ).

In sum, much of what we know with respect to platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, or even WeChat ( 56 ) needs to still be investigated in the context of TikTok, to understand if psychological observations made for other social media channels can be transferred “one-on-one” to TikTok. For instance, illustrating differences between social media platforms, Bhandari and Bimo ( 57 ) suggested in their analysis of TikTok that in contrast to other platforms, “the crux of interaction is not between users and their social network, but between a user and what we call an ‘algorithmized’ version of self.” Opening TikTok immediately results in being captured by a personalized stream of videos. Therefore, we believe it to be unlikely that all insights from social media research can be easily transferred to TikTok because it is well-known that each social media platform has a unique design also attracting different user groups ( 45 ), and they elicit different immersive or “addictive” potential ( 58 ). Please note that we use the term “addictive” only in quotation marks, given the ongoing debate on the actual nature of excessive social media use ( 59 , 60 ). This said, we explicitly mention that the study of problematic social media use represents a very important topic ( 61 ), although at the moment, this condition—of relevance for the mental health sciences—is not officially recognized by the World Health Organization. Despite the ongoing controversy, nevertheless, it has been recently pointed out that social media companies are responsible for the well-being of users, too ( 55 ).

Conclusions and Outlook

Although user numbers are high and TikTok represents a highly successful social media platform around the globe, we know surprisingly less about psychological mechanisms related to TikTok use. Most research has been carried out so far yielding insights into user motives applying uses and gratification theory. Although this theory is of high importance to understand TikTok use, it is still rather broad and general. In particular, when studying a platform such as TikTok—receiving attention at the moment from a lot of young users—more specific needs or facets of the broad dimensions of uses and gratification theory (such as social usage) being more strongly related to the needs of adolescents might need more focus. One such focus could be a stronger emphasis on the study of self-esteem ( 62 ) in the context of TikTok use. Work beyond this area, e.g., investigating potential detrimental aspects, are scarce, but will be important. In particular, we deem this to be true, as TikTok attracts very young users, being more vulnerable to detrimental aspects of social media use ( 63 ). We believe that it is also high time for researchers to put research energy in the study of TikTok and to do so in a comprehensive manner. Among others, it needs also to be studied how active and passive use impact on the well-being of the users. This means that the here-discussed how-, why- , and who- questions need to be studied together in one framework, and this needs to be done against the data business model and its immersive platform design. The key ideas of this review to understand TikTok use and related aspects such as well-being of the users are presented in Figure 1 .

In order to understand the relationship between a social media service such as TikTok and human psychological processes and behavior, one needs to answer the who-, why-, and how-questions, also against the background of the social media platform design. Please note that the platform design itself is driven by the data business model. Social media usage and its association with psychological/behavioral variables such as well-being, online-time, and so on can be best understood by investigating these variables in one model, at best also investigating potential interactions of variables. These ideas have also been described in parts in Montag and Hegelich ( 22 ), Kross et al. ( 50 ), and Montag et al. ( 55 ). The figure does not exclusively mention TikTok because we are convinced that the presented details are true for all research agendas aiming at a better understanding of the relationship between social media use and well-being.

Author Contributions

CM wrote the first draft of this review article. HY screened the Chinese literature and added relevant work from a Chinese perspective to the review. Finally, JDE critically worked over the complete draft. All authors agreed upon the final version of the article.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

1 https://www.omnicoreagency.com/tiktok-statistics/ (accessed March 9, 2021).

2 https://www.statista.com/statistics/1089420/tiktok-annual-first-time-installs/ (accessed March 9, 2021).

3 https://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Ab-16-TikTok-fuehrt-Mindestalter-fuer-Direktnachrichten-ein-4703887.html (accessed March 9, 2021).

4 https://www.statista.com/statistics/1095186/tiktok-us-users-age/ (accessed March 9, 2021).

5 https://www.statista.com/statistics/1095196/tiktok-us-age-gender-reach/ (accessed March 9, 2021).

Michael R. Langlais 1 * , Cameron Boudreau 2 , Leena Asad 2

AM J QUALITATIVE RES, Volume 8, Issue 3, pp. 95-112

https://doi.org/10.29333/ajqr/14896

OPEN ACCESS   735 Views   318 Downloads

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Although research has identified how and why individuals use TikTok, it’s unclear how these behaviors and motivations impact close relationships. Using tenets from the uses and gratifications theory and media multiplexity theory, the goal of this study is to describe how emerging adults use TikTok in the context of romantic relationships. This qualitative study employed a descriptive design, where undergraduate college students completed an individual interview via Zoom (N = 64) describing how TikTok was used during relationship development and maintenance. Four research assistants and two principal investigators analyzed the data using reflexive thematic analyses applying Braun and Clarke’s (2022) six-step approach. The resulting themes regarding how emerging adults used TikTok in relationships were: (1) relationship initiation, (2) viewing relationship content, (3) sharing content in relationship, and (4) posting relationship content. Participants also described their use of TikTok in relationships as a potential source of conflict. Implications for TikTok use in relationships, including comparisons to other social media platforms, are discussed.

Keywords: TikTok, romantic relationships, relationship maintenance, emerging adults, qualitative descriptive

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• Corpus ID: 247802089

A Qualitative Case Study on TikTok: The Silver Lining for Brands During the Coronavirus Pandemic

• Halle Brennan
• Published 2021

One Citation

Alternati̇f haberci̇li̇k çerçevesi̇nde ti̇ktok: poli̇tai̇nment ve bi̇r ‘eğlence haber’ araci olarak ti̇ktok platformunun potansi̇yeli̇, 33 references, the impact of covid-19 pandemic on corporate social responsibility and marketing philosophy, social media marketing gains importance after covid-19, covid-19 and advertising: the case for a paradigm shift, the impact of social media marketing on brand loyalty, using social media to increase advertising and improve marketing, engagement with social media and social media advertising: the differentiating role of platform type, investigating the impact of social media advertising features on customer purchase intention, consumer engagement with ewom on social media: the role of social capital, advertising and covid-19, the case study approach, related papers.

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Tinca Lukan

A Journey from researcher to influencer: TikTok as a methodological tool

19 December 2023 | doi:10.5281/zenodo.10404739 | No Comments

Tinca Lukan explores TikTok's use in ethnographic research on social media influencers, detailing how she integrated it into her PhD study on influencers' working conditions in Slovenia.

Introduction

In this blog post I dive into the integration of TikTok as a methodological tool for doing ethnographic research on social media influencers. TikTok has skyrocketed in popularity, boasting 672 million downloads in 2022, making it the most downloaded entertainment app globally (Statista). Beyond just entertainment, it has evolved into a go-to search engine for younger generations seeking information about products, services, and explanations (Kalley, 2022). TikTok’s wide appeal stems from the fact that it is an algorithmic media. Its algorithms smartly curate, personalise and serve content to those most likely to be interested in. 

The surge in TikTok’s popularity has sparked a vibrant collection of academic literature delving into the intricacies of this platform. From a research perspective, TikTok is mostly used as a rich source of user generated content that reflects cultural trends, expressions and social dynamics. While many researchers have examined TikTok and the cultures that arise on the platform (for overview see Abidin and Kaye, 2021), my approach differs. I didn’t solely treat TikTok as the subject of analysis; rather I utilised it as a methodological tool to navigate and address the elements of ethnographic research into my study. This means I did ethnography through a platform.

First things first. Why would a busy PhD student transform her leisurely TikTok scrolling into a legitimate part of her job? The answer is my doctoral dissertation in which I examine the working conditions of social media influencers with the main research question: What shapes the working conditions of social media influencers in Slovenia? I understand influencers according to the definition of Crystal Abidin (2016) who defined influencers as ordinary internet users who accumulate a large number of followers through textual and visual narrations of their personal lives. This means I focus on influencers whose content centres around their lifestyle and everyday life and not for example, influencers who promote political ideologies. What distinguishes influencers from content creators is that they monetise their community of followers through advertising, brand sponsorship, revenue sharing models, subscriptions and merchandise sales.

In order to get an answer to the question of what shapes the working conditions of social media influencers in Slovenia, I used an ethnographic approach and utilised TikTok on various steps of the research process. Out of my research came 53 in-depth semi-structured interviews with influencers, and (hopefully) soon, doctoral dissertation. Find me on TikTok under the handle Tinca_Lukan . Just a heads up, I speak in the language of my empirical setting which is Slovenia.

In the upcoming sections, I’ll present my journey of utilising TikTok as my research field. I’ll share how it became a key player in achieving theoretical saturation, unveiling my position in the field, securing access to interviewees, fostering rapport, managing engagement, and obtaining validation from research participants. Additionally, I’ll delve into how this process shifted my role from a researcher to an influencer and demonstrate that researchers can leverage the platform not just as a source of data but also as a tool for scientific engagement and channel of communication with the broader audience. 

TikTok as a field

In ethnography, the term “field” refers to the specific social or cultural setting where an ethnographer conducts their research. The field is an environment or community that the ethnographer immerses themselves in to study social dynamics, behaviours, and cultural practices of the people within that setting (O’Reilly, 2012). In a traditional sense, the field most often denotes a geographically bounded location, “imagine yourself suddenly set down surrounded by all your gear, alone on a tropical beach close to native village” (Malinowski, 1922: 4). 

While conducting research on influencers’ working conditions, my investigation didn’t lead me to a tropical beach but rather to the algorithmic realm of the social media platform TikTok. While I also focused on influencers present on Instagram and YouTube, I started with TikTok because of its excellent recommendation algorithm. As with any other social media platform, what TikTok chooses to show is based on how we use the app, but the main difference is, as MIT Technology Review put it, “TikTok is simply better at it” (Ohlheiser, 2021). As influencers are platform-native workers (Poell et al., 2021), it becomes useful to consider social media platforms as one of our fields of research. By designating TikTok as my research field, the initial entry was straightforward, devoid of gatekeepers, as creating a TikTok account is a seamless process. With the account set up, the subsequent step was identifying potential research participants. TikTok’s algorithm, designed to provide content aligned with perceived user interests, played a pivotal role in achieving the next step of ethnographic research, which pertains to saturation.

TikTok for achieving saturation

Saturation refers to the point in a research study when the collection of new data ceases to provide additional insights or generate new information (O’Reilly, 2012). It also pertains to the concept of theoretical sampling, which involves explicitly seeking out people and cases relevant to the specific angle or topic under focus. Angele Christin (2020) argues that we can employ algorithms to assist with theoretical sampling. I utilised the algorithmic systems underpinning TikTok to identify potential research participants.

In this context, TikTok For You Page (FYP) became crucial as it was the platform where I sought individuals engaged in content creation and monetizing this activity through brand collaborations. FYP is a central feature of TikTok wherein the algorithm curates a personalized feed for each user. The videos on this page are not solely based on a user’s existing network but also encompass content predicted by the algorithm to be of potential interest. This feature proved particularly useful for my research as I aimed to discover unknown influencers who might appear on my FYP.

Utilising the TikTok algorithm to assist in identifying potential research participants, that is, internet users who share their personal lives on social media and monetise it through various business ventures, introduced specific challenges to my study. While seeking individuals for interviews, I encountered a recurrent pattern of recommendations, presenting influencers aligned with my personal interests. I consistently received content from female influencers in their late 20s who promoted a healthy lifestyle and wholesome food preparations. I found myself in what Pariser (2011) termed a “filter bubble.” This concept describes the personalised and selective information ecosystems shaped by online platforms and algorithms. It arises when algorithms predict and selectively present information based on assumptions about a user’s preferences. The filter bubble, in this case featuring female influencers promoting a healthy lifestyle, shed light on and allowed me to explore another crucial aspect of ethnographic research — positionality in the field.

TikTok for revealing positionality

Reflexivity urges researchers to recognize their positionality in the field and the inherent situatedness of knowledge. This is because ethnographers’ access to the field is mediated by their socio-demographic characteristics, such as gender, age, class, and race (Hammersley and Atkinson, 2007). Positionality encompasses the acknowledgment that the researchers’ background, identity, experiences, and perspectives can influence the research process, including the way data is collected, interpreted, and presented.

While searching for influencers through TikTok, the algorithmic recommendations revealed my positionality in the field and mirrored back my identity and personal interests. The filter bubble, dominated by lifestyle female influencers shed light on my position in the field as a cisgender, white woman of the late millennial generation, allowing me to encounter my “algorithmic self” (Bishop and Kant, 2023). This encounter prompted me to reflect on biases and assumptions, and my role in the research process. My identity markers might explain that the most insightful interviews stemmed from influencers who shared similarities with me, fostering a same-gender and generational relationship between me and the interviewees.

To escape the “filter bubble” dominated by female influencers, I intentionally manipulated the algorithm by altering my TikTok content consumption habits. I achieved this by following accounts and engaging with posts by male influencers. Consequently, I trained and effectively “tricked” the algorithm into recommending male influencers across a variety of content genres. The subsequent challenge involved conducting interviews for the purpose of getting insights into their working conditions.

TikTok to gain access to research participants

In ethnography, access refers to the researcher’s ability to enter and establish connections with the community or setting being studied. It involves gaining permission, trust, and acceptance from the individuals or groups in the field to observe, participate, and collect data (Neuman, 2003). In my case, access pertains to getting influencers to agree to talk to me and participate in my research. This was challenging as they were unresponsive to my requests for interviews. To secure access, I utilised TikTok again. I started creating videos where I discussed and essentially “advertised” my research on influencers, introducing myself and expressing my interest in conducting interviews with them. I included one of these videos about my research in the recruitment emails sent to influencers, enabling them to see me in a familiar format to them. 

Before extending our roles as researchers into the influencer culture, we should be mindful of ethical standards as well as the impact of our engagement on TikTok on the research object. Concerning ethics, it is crucial but challenging to find balance with creating engaging content and maintaining the accuracy and credibility of research findings, because platforms’ logics could quickly nudge us into creating clickbait content. There is also a challenge of ensuring privacy and anonymity of research participants. The latter became a challenge as will be discussed in the next section. It is also worth noting that researchers have to be prepared to engage with the audience, which may include answering questions, comments and often also receiving criticism and hate. 

Becoming a content creator myself and promoting my research this way means that the level of involvement of me as a researcher in the field changed from being a full observer to becoming an observer as a participant as I also became a content creator on TikTok. By becoming an influencer myself, I succeeded in generating significant interest in my research among influencers, creating an appealing experience for them.

In addition, I produced different kinds of videos. Given that ethnographic fieldwork involves conducting interviews, I adapted interview questions to fit the TikTok environment. I created videos in which I presented a single interview question, such as asking about their work hours and work location. In these videos, I followed the ethnographic recommendation of acting as an “acceptable incompetent,” trying to appear as a friendly outsider who wants to learn more about the way of life of the studied community (O’Reilly, 2012). In the comments, influencers responded, for example, that they mostly work from home and that influencer hubs in malls are not relevant to their labour. I followed up with individuals who commented on my videos by asking them in a reply comment if they would be interested in participating in an interview.

TikTok for building rapport

In ethnography, rapport is the ability to connect with others in a way that creates a climate of trust and understanding (Glesne, 1989). Rapport refers to the quality of the relationship and understanding between the researcher and the members of the community being studied. A positive rapport enables the researcher to gain access to information, observe more authentically, and establish a deeper understanding of the culture and social dynamics within the community. For building rapport social skills and personal charm of the researcher are needed and researchers need to show real interest in their interlocutors, sincerity and share emotions (Condon et al., 2019).

I utilised TikTok to tackle the challenge of building rapport. I created videos showcasing my passion for research, offering a behind-the-scenes of what it looks like to work as a researcher. I documented my travels to interviews, displayed the setup, equipment used, and portrayed the daily aspects of my job. I was able to bring my research participants insights into “science in the making” (Shapin, 1992). Regularly sharing content led to increased recognition of my face. This, in turn, had an impact on marketing conferences, where my fieldwork also took place, as influencers began approaching me and inquiring about my research. The insight they gained into my content and daily life created a sense of familiarity before our actual interviews, enabling them to speak more freely. During the interviews, I wasn’t a stranger to them.

This also presented a unique challenge for me as a researcher. As my research gained interest, some influencers expressed a desire to be featured in my TikTok content, eliminating the possibility of maintaining their anonymity. I included them in my content as a way of expressing gratitude for their interviews, which also helped alleviate the feelings of researcher guilt.I incorporated influencers into my content by creating “spend a day with me” videos, documenting my day as a researcher. In one segment, I featured an influencer sitting in a cafe and waving at me at the end of the interview. 

(Dis)engagement

In ethnography, disengagement refers to the process of withdrawing or ending the researcher’s involvement in the field or with the community under study. Disengagement requires ethical handling as it involves concluding the researcher’s presence in the community and potentially ceasing interactions with participants. We know about feelings of alienation and guilt towards informats on the part of researchers and how disengagement from the field often feels as a form of betrayal and leaving behind the people that helped and informed the research as “friendships are made and perhaps ended, perhaps retained” (Adler and Adler, 2007).

In my case, as already recognized by Christin and Lewis (2021), incorporating social media platforms as a component of the research entails a fundamental absence of disengagement from the field. Through TikTok, algorithmic connections between me and my informants persist even after the fieldwork is completed. I stay connected and continue to interact with my research participants by liking and commenting on their posts from my TikTok profile. In the case of social media, disengagement from the field would be quite harsh, such as unfollowing or blocking them. It is worth noting that staying in touch with my research participants through TikTok helped me overcome feelings of betrayal and alienation after my fieldwork was completed. 

TikTok for participants’ validation

Ethnographic research strives to achieve validity, concordance of the world as seen by the participants with the world as interpreted by the researcher. It often involves member validation whereby members of the studied community evaluate suitability of the results. This means sharing the research findings with research participants to verify the accuracy of the interpretations. Participants are given the opportunity to provide feedback, corrections, or additional insights to ensure that their perspectives are accurately represented (Neuman, 2003).

To seek validation, I utilised TikTok. I created five videos where I presented my research findings and interpretations and in the end asked influencers whether they agree with my findings. In the comments, I often received comments that they know very well what I am talking about and thus obtained their validation. It’s important to acknowledge that seeking validation from influencers commenting on my videos may introduce a confirmation bias. The comments validating my research findings, could potentially reflect a bias rather than genuine confirmation. This is due to two main factors: firstly, the self-selection of individuals who choose to comment on these posts, with only around 10 out of 53 interviewees engaging in this way. Secondly, there is a possibility that these validating comments are influenced by social desirability bias – the tendency for individuals to respond in a manner that is perceived favourably by the researcher. Therefore, these comments primarily serve as personal feedback for me and should not be regarded as scientific validation of my results in the context of my doctoral thesis.

TikTok videos discussing my research findings serve another purpose in the research process: science communication. Sharing information about my research beyond the academic sphere is beneficial. I received 12,000 views on my videos about my research findings, and while it may not be considered viral fame, when considering that a PhD student, if fortunate, may have their supervisor read their dissertation, achieving this number of views is noteworthy. Additionally, I will soon provide further insights on utilising short-form videos for science communication on the HIIG website as an open educational resource. Stay tuned for more details.

Conclusion: Fieldwork as a personal transformation of the researcher

Fieldwork necessitates researchers’ complete immersion in a specific culture, and this immersive experience can potentially bring about transformations in researchers, influencing their values and emotions. In my case, engaging in fieldwork went beyond conventional expectations, leading to a transformation in my professional role. Utilising TikTok as a methodological tool, I not only assumed the role of a researcher but also embraced the identity of an influencer. This dual role was particularly valuable as it allowed me to understand the processes of content creation, idea generation, and the challenges of navigating algorithms for visibility. By immersing myself in the influencer role, I gained insights into their cultural references, dramas, and feuds, enabling me to participate more fully in these conversations.

The transition into an influencer role has altered my professional identity, a phenomenon Sophie Bishop (2023) refers to as “influencer creep.” This concept underscores how influencer cultures are permeating and influencing practices across various professions. Influencer creep involves the adoption of self-branding, optimization, and authenticity, and as a researcher, I have drawn from these influencer techniques. The incorporation of TikTok as a methodological tool serves as a tangible example of how influencer culture norms have transcended their original domain, infiltrating the landscape of academic research. This integration blurs the boundaries between traditional academic roles and the evolving social media-influencer labour. There are many pitfalls of influencer culture creeping into the academic profession, like requiring self-promotion and experiencing hate and hostility on social media. For example, one commenter of my video dismissed the relevance of researching influencers, likening it to a “second-grade middle school essay”. Despite these challenges, I would employ this methodology again. It has helped me to engage better with my research participants because I genuinely experienced what it means to seek visibility on social media. It has also improved my ability to communicate my research in an accessible and understandable manner. My TikTok also helped me legitimise the research topic of social media influencers as due to my content on TikTok mainstream media in Slovenia became interested in the topic of social media influencers and they regularly contact me to comment on this topic which helped me to popularise this topic and make it legitimate as influencing is career aspiration of many young people and presents the present and future of work.

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Author info

Tinca Lukan is a PhD researcher at the University of Ljubljana and a research fellow at the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society. Her research focuses on influencer cultures and science communication on social media platforms. She actively engages in science communication by analyzing the internet on TikTok from a sociological perspective, using the handle Tinca_Lukan.

The TikTok Cultures Research Network is a portal for scholarly resources, research projects, and events that connects networks of qualitative scholars of various disciplines from around the world.

Latest News

September 2024 : TCRN held our 10th event, TikTok Cultures in Korea , co-hosted with the Korea Research & Engagement Centre of Western Australia. This one-day online symposium was held on 09 September 2024 . 

Recordings from this event will be available soon.

July 2024 : Recordings from our second satellite online event, Latin American Cultures on TikTok are now available! This event featured live translation and can be watched in English or Spanish.

Find out more about this event and watch recordings here .

March 2024 : Prof Crystal Abidin recently featured in a cross-media ABC Australia package focused on TikTok livestreaming. This included a digital story (also featuring Dr Jin Lee), a liveblog , an episode of the Future Tense podcast , and short-form video .

December 2023 : The TikTok Cultures Research Network is pleased to announce the publication of ’ A Retrospect on Young People and COVID-19 Discourse on TikTok ’. This report contains a summary of findings from a series of projects undertaken by TCRN from 2019 to 2023. These projects focused on pandemic-related discourses by young people on the short video platform.

Find out more and download this open access report here .

Our Virtual Events with leading academics explore a wide range of TikTok scholarship.

Recordings from our seventh event, ‘TikTok & Children’ symposium are available here.

Browse the research our Members have published in Special Issues, Journal Articles, Reports, Books, Talks and Media.

The TikTok Cultures Research Network have edited three Special Issue Journals .

We aim to provide resources of scholarship on TikTok cultures. Our Bibliographies and Syllabi document the significant research being published globally.

Explore our third TikTok Syllabus (2023) here .

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