Symptom Borrowing Meaning: Why Social Media Health Videos Trigger Health Anxiety

We have all done it. Watched a TikTok video about a health condition and thought to ourselves that, actually, we might have that too. In fact, during an average evening scroll through social media, I could probably diagnose myself with 3-5 conditions that I had never previously heard of before.

This is because, according to Josef Newton, founder of the health anxiety app Condri, our repeated exposure to rapid-form health content makes us reinterpret or even experience symptoms we hadn’t noticed before. This is called ‘symptom borrowing’.

‘Symptom borrowing’ is a term used to describe an instance where frequent exposure to somebody else’s symptoms leads you to progressively notice, reinterpret or expect similar sensations and behaviours in yourself.

“This does not mean that a person is consciously copying, pretending or imagining an illness”, says Newton.

“The sensations may feel entirely real. Instead, attention, expectation and anxiety can amplify everyday physical feelings or behaviours that previously went unnoticed.”

Additionally, because of the intelligent nature of algorithms, it only takes a small number of interactions with a topic for it to fill your feed. This can make a relatively common diagnosis feel both familiar and personally relevant.

Newton urges: “The concern here is that few content creators are medical professionals and serve anecdotal evidence only”.

Research by the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry analysed 100 TikTok videos that centred around the topic of ADHD, finding that 52% were classified as misleading. 21% were categorised as useful, whilst the misleading videos were mostly uploaded by creators who are not healthcare professionals.

“Social media often provides valuable education, language and validation, but short-form videos don’t replicate clinical assessments”, says Newton.

“Of course, TikTok can be the reason a user recognises a genuine problem and seeks support, which is a positive. It becomes problematic when recognition evolves into monitoring. Once you have learnt a list of symptoms, your brain may begin to search for them.”

One of the clearest and simplest warning signs is that you cannot remember being concerned about a symptom until you watched a video describing it.

You may watch a video, and after acknowledging a particular condition, consciously or subconsciously scan your body, memory or behaviour to obtain supporting evidence. For instance, a person who watches content about chronic shoulder pain may suddenly grow conscious of every change in their arms and shoulders. Someone watching videos about a short attention span may begin recording every occasion where they become distracted.

Such eventualities often align with selective attention. In other words, when the brain decides that a sensation or behaviour is important, it becomes easier to detect.

“A great example of this is if somebody asks you to notice how your tongue feels in your mouth; it suddenly becomes difficult to ignore”, Newton explains.

“The sensation was always there, but attention has made it prominent. Health videos can replicate a similar effect.”

Great, now I’m aware of my tongue all over again.

However, he urges: “This does not prove that a symptom is insignificant, but timing matters. Ask yourself whether it existed consistently before you encountered the content, whether other people had noticed it and whether it caused meaningful difficulty in your everyday life.”

A clear signal that you’re symptom borrowing is if your health concern regularly evolves or changes according to whatever symptoms are dominating your For You Page.

One week, tiredness and poor concentration may signal ADHD, whereas the next indicate burnout, long COVID, or low iron. Essentially, rather than beginning with a stable pattern of difficulties and seeking an explanation, the diagnosis arrives first, and your experiences are moulded around it.

Watching a video once may prompt useful reflection. Repeatedly checking yourself afterwards may serve as symptom borrowing.

This might involve monitoring your pulse, examining your skin, testing your memory, comparing your behaviour with online checklists or repeatedly asking friends whether they have noticed a particular trait. The NHS lists frequent body checking, seeking reassurance, and obsessively looking at health information among the behaviours associated with health anxiety.

“If you find yourself always checking your symptoms, make an effort to ask yourself what the checking is achieving and what is your objective,” Newton advises.

“If checking your symptoms or watching another video calms you for only a few minutes before you need to do it again, it is probably maintaining the fear rather than answering it.”

To hold the viewers’ attention, short-form health videos are designed for viewers to quickly recognise themselves. As a result, general and ultimately common experiences such as procrastinating, feeling awkward at parties or becoming tired after socialising may be positioned as symptoms of a certain condition.

Someone caught in a symptom-borrowing cycle may accumulate several possible diagnoses, even when those labels are based on disconnected traits rather than one clear clinical history. They may even begin rewriting ordinary memories through the lens of the content they have consumed.

“It’s important to recognise relatability Vs diagnostic accuracy”, says Newton.

“Content reels rarely provide context and instead focus solely on the result. Rather than asking how many online symptoms you can match, consider three things: how long they have been present, whether they appear in several areas of your life and whether they create significant impairment.”

Reliable health information should help you understand your options and decide whether to seek appropriate support. Symptom borrowing tends to do the opposite.

You may finish one video feeling reassured, only for the next to introduce a new symptom, exception or worst-case scenario. You save dozens of posts, read the comments for confirmation and continue scrolling because certainty always appears to be one more video away.

Newton advises: “Pay attention to how you feel after consuming the content. If you are more frightened, confused or compelled to keep searching, the videos are no longer functioning as useful health education.

“Set a clear boundary: write down the concern, step away from symptom content and consult an appropriate professional or reputable medical source. One qualified conversation is likely to be more useful than another hour of conflicting videos.”

Symptom borrowing should never be used to dismiss a new, persistent or worsening health problem. Short-form content can sometimes help people recognise symptoms they had previously overlooked, particularly where a condition has historically been misunderstood.

However, social media should be treated as a prompt to seek reliable information, not as a diagnostic tool.