The legacy of diet culture – Scot Scoop News

The morning her family made pancakes without her was one that Elina Mahanta* vividly remembers. She couldn’t eat a single bite. Not because of a lack of hunger, but because she didn’t know every single ingredient to divide up into calories. The smell of butter and sugar should have felt comforting, but instead, anxiety bubbled inside of her.

Six months later, when she was hospitalized for her low blood pressure and weakened heart rate, she realized how much anorexia nervosa had taken away from her. 

For Mahanta, social pressure and cultural factors contributed heavily to her struggle with anorexia.

“It started in middle school because my friends were always talking about gaining and dropping weight. They would talk about how they don’t eat lunch or tricks they use not to feel hungry,” Mahanta said. 

In the locker rooms, the whispers and comparisons felt casual, but every word stuck with her. 

“There was this idea that being thinner makes you more athletic,” Mahanta said.

These pressures were amplified by the cultural expectations surrounding body image. Growing up in a mixed East and South Asian household, she experienced her grandparents making comments about her body. 

“East Asian culture is very much about commenting on weight,” Mahanta said. 

Over time, the combination of middle school influence and family commentary pushed her towards diet-focused eating habits. Her experience is also part of a larger conversation about diet culture, which influences teenagers long before the development of an eating disorder.

This fixation didn’t appear out of nowhere. It’s tied to ideas that have been reinforced for hundreds of years. Diet culture holds beliefs that promote thinness, appearance and weight loss as the ultimate goals of health. Diet culture is measured through the body mass index (BMI). The number given indicates whether one is considered underweight, normal weight, overweight, or obese. 

“A BMI is your weight for height. That doesn’t tell me where your fat is in your body, how much fat you have, or where your muscle is. It doesn’t give me any of the information that I need to know if you are healthy,” said Ashley Koff, a registered dietician and founder of the Better Nutrition Program. 

BMI was developed by Adolphe Quetelet to define the “normal man,” and was later promoted by Ancel Keys, whose research only included 7,426 healthy men and didn’t involve an equal distribution of different ethnicities, races or backgrounds. 

According to the National Alliance for Eating Disorders, diet culture is tied to a long history of racism.

“There is privilege in being in a thinner body in this society, and in many societies too,” said Elizabeth Aong, a holistic trauma-informed dietician. 

Over time, these ideas have evolved through the usage of social media, fueling a rise in fad diets. Even for teenagers without developed eating disorders, social media exposes them to constant dieting trends and comparisons.

Recent research has continued to find that social media has a major influence on dieting behaviors. A 2025 study published in BMC Public Health found that women who spent more time on social media were more likely to have unhealthy diet obsessions.

“I think that we as individuals in society with access to social media need to be more accountable for where we take information from and where we make our choices from,” Koff said.

With so much advice circulating online, the line between healthy and harmful diets becomes blurred. 

“We get conflicting messages all the time. We eat less, and that should help us lose weight and become healthier, but it doesn’t. On the other hand, it can lead to having higher blood sugars and then a poor relationship with food that develops the disconnection with the body, too,” Aong said. “We listen to external advice and don’t pay attention to what our bodies are telling us.”

The price of perfection

Ideas seen throughout history don’t just stay online or remain in history books; they shape habits. For Mahanta, it began with exercise.

Before her freshman year, she began exercising strenuously. During her ninth grade physical education (PE) nutrition unit, she learned to track her nutrition and pay attention to her caloric intake.

By winter break, her portion sizes decreased significantly. What began as a way to stay in shape slowly transformed into an unhealthy pattern.

Much of her routine was shaped by misconceptions. “I underestimated how much activity I did and didn’t realize that 2,000 calories is not enough for most teenagers,” Mahanta said.

According to UCHealth, teenage girls aged 11-15 require 2,200 calories daily, while older teens need approximately 3,000 calories. When active athletes don’t consume enough calories, it puts them at risk of Relative Energy Deficiency in Sports (RED-S).

However, the fixation on numerical control can make eating feel more high-stakes, rather than as a natural part of life.

“I have a lot of people who are chasing these total numbers in the day, and then calories are not all created equal. Calories in, calories out does not work, and it’s not the way that the body is designed,” Koff said.

For Mahanta, this translated into late nights of extreme activity. 

“I went to sleep really late because I thought that you would burn more calories if you were awake, walking around. I would pace around my room and do exercises until 2 a.m. or until I passed out,” Mahanta said. 

After three months, her weight began to drop drastically. Clothes fit loosely, and her size dropped.

“When your body runs out of fat, it starts to eat your muscles, including your organs. That’s why my heart was weak,” Mahanta said. 

The reality didn’t fully hit her until her doctor called her parents in the middle of the school day, pulling her out of class with no explanation. One moment, she was at her desk, and the next, she was being driven to the hospital. When she was unwillingly put in the hospital room and hooked up to monitors, she finally understood the consequences of what she thought was healthy.

The day she was hospitalized marked the beginning of her recovery.

“Once people know and you’re on the path of recovery, you can’t get out of it. I just went to therapy, and slowly it got better,” Mahanta said.

The road to recovery

It’s easy to fall into the trap of quick-fix diets, but teenagers can learn to go beyond what they see on the internet.

“It really goes back to disconnection from the self, because you’re afraid to trust what your body is telling you and relying on external people or culture to tell you what to do,” Aong said. 

Rebuilding trust with your body is a complex process to go through, especially with the struggle of an eating disorder.

“Healing from an eating disorder is a clinical protocol of how to address any nutritional insufficiencies and be able to help you feed yourself and give your body what it needs,” Koff said.

While most teenagers won’t develop a clinical eating disorder, the normalization of dieting, calorie counting and body comparisons can still create anxiety surrounding food. For those who do need help, the systems that aid recovery often reflect the same inequities that shape diet culture itself. 

Organizations like Project HEAL work to challenge systemic barriers, allowing people from all communities to access treatment. 

“The most significant thing that Project HEAL does is supporting eating disorder patients with financial aid,” said Eunchan Lee, a Project HEAL ambassador and survivor of anorexia and binge eating. 

According to Project HEAL, some intensive outpatient treatments can cost $1,500 a week. For many, financial support is the difference between struggling alone and being able to access recovery aid. 

However, for Lee, her reasons for joining the Project HEAL mission go beyond finances.

“When I was young, I didn’t have much awareness of these mental illnesses and how to seek help. I just internalized my struggles as weaknesses and refused to share what I was going through, even with my family and close friends,” Lee said. 

Lee wants to those who are going through what she went through because she knows how challenging eating disorders are, especially in today’s complex society. 

“A lot of people have become prone to comparing what they see on their screen, and are not aware that those things that they see online are definitely filtered and edited,” Lee said.

Both Lee and Mahanta’s experiences highlight the extremities diet culture can cause, and how it shapes beliefs. With more awareness and support, teenagers can learn to rewrite their relationship with food on their own terms.

“We have so much emotion, and each of us has our own histories and relationships with food,” Aong said.

*This source’s name has been changed to protect their privacy in accordance with Carlmont Media’s Scot Scoop Anonymous Sourcing Policy.