Creating and sharing content that ostensibly inspires fitness remains a popular use of Instagram. Most research examining #fitspiration involves content from over five years ago. This study aims to understand constructions of fitness motivation in Instagram posts labelled ‘#fitspiration’ from 2021 and draw comparisons to posts from 2014. A dataset of 1000 posts labelled #fitspiration was extracted from Instagram; 210 were excluded as were video stills, resulting in a final sample of 790. Content analysis showed images mainly contained exercise-related content, people, and text. People were typically depicted in gendered and objectified ways, and also adhered to sociocultural body ideals surrounding thinness and muscularity. While similar to the 2014 dataset, significantly more exercise images, and significantly fewer diet images were found. There were also fewer markers of objectification and thin and/or muscular bodies. Reflexive thematic analysis was used to analyse text contained within images. Three themes were developed; (1) “Never miss a Monday”: Fitness and health have rules, (2) Just do it: Lifting the weight of self-doubt, and (3) Strive to be the best: Consequences of decision-making. Like the 2014 dataset, themes constructed thin and muscular bodies as the desired end-goal of fitness and emphasised personal responsibility for fitness practices. However, some messages from 2014 were less salient (e.g., equating fitness with sexual attractiveness) and also different ways of motivating fitness were identified (e.g., through instruction). Combined, analyses highlight how #fitspiration content in 2021 was very similar to 2014, but with more emphasis on exercise and slightly less on appearance.
ORCID: 
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)