Social Media’s Role in Promoting Physical Activity: The Case of Fitness Coach Joe Wicks (Preprint)

Abstract

During the COVID-19 lockdowns that were occurring around the world in 2020, restrictions were placed on the amount of outdoor physical activity people could undertake. In response, Joe Wicks (a fitness coach) posted daily fitness workouts on social media.

The aim of this study was to develop an understanding of the influence of Joe Wicks on Twitter and examine the impact on physical activity amongst the public.

The study used NodeXL to retrieve data from Twitter, which was analysed using social network analysis. Data were retrieved over 54 days (March 23 to May 15, 2020), corresponding to several COVID-19 lockdowns that were taking place around the world. A total of 290,649 tweets were retrieved. These tweets were analysed using social network analysis, thematic analysis, time-series analysis, and location analysis.

The study found that there was significant engagement with content generated by Wicks, including retweets, likes, and comments. Our study found that 37.5% of tweets contained images, videos, and text of youngsters undertaking physical activity by watching content created by Joe Wicks, with 12.5% of tweets coming from schools encouraging pupils to engage with the content. In addition, other groups of influencers added to engagement with Wicks via their own networks. Wicks’ network of influence, therefore, contained numerous sub-communities and resembled a broadcast network shape. Other content encouraged others to join into the fitness classes run by Wicks (22.5%) and other content contained general commentary (37.5%).

The study concludes that Wicks was influential during the lockdown, leading to large numbers of people engaging with his social media content. The study, therefore, asserts that an influencer can create networks of influence, which are exhibited in distinctive ways. We conclude that in the future, government officials should employ influencers as a channel of communication for health messaging and promotion and as a means to influence people’s physical activity.