Impact Ambivalence: How People with Eating Disorders Get Trapped in the Perpetual Cycle of Digital Food Content Engagement

Digital food content could impact viewers' dietary health, with individuals with eating disorders being particularly sensitive to it. However, a comprehensive understanding of why and how these individuals interact with such content is lacking. To fill this void, we conducted exploratory (N=23) and in-depth studies (N=22) with individuals with eating disorders to understand their motivations and practices of consuming digital food content. We reveal that participants engaged with digital food content for both disorder-driven and recovery-supporting motivations, leading to conflicting outcomes. This impact ambivalence, the coexistence of recovery-supporting benefits and disorder-exacerbating risks, sustained a cycle of quitting, prompted by awareness of harm, and returning, motivated by anticipated benefits. We interpret these dynamics within dual systems theory and highlight how recognizing such ambivalence can inform the design of interventions that foster healthier digital food content engagement and mitigate post-engagement harmful effects.