Doc debunks ‘dangerous’ viral trend that claims to test if food is healthy
By McKenzie Beard
Is your body trying to tell you something?
TikTok’s latest health hack has users ditching nutrition labels and instead relying on “muscle reactions” to judge which foods are good for them.
Fans claim that the method can reveal hidden food sensitivities, chemical imbalances, suppressed emotions and even help guide dating choices. But not everyone’s convinced.
“This is the most ridiculous almond mom behavior that I have ever seen,” Blake Sanburg, a health and nutrition influencer, said in a recent TikTok.
Woman looking thoughtful while grocery shopping.
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People are using so-called muscle testing to decide what foods to eat.
Peruphotoart – stock.adobe.com
The comment section is just as skeptical, with one user dubbing the viral trend the “Ouija board of wellness.”
The Post spoke with Dr. Alex Maryansky, director of pain management at Northwell’s Staten Island University Hospital, to get the lowdown on muscle testing — and how this seemingly harmless fad could could go sideways.
What is muscle testing?
“This trend is just a modernized version of a practice called “applied kinesiology” which originated in 1964,” Maryansky explained.
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Online videos show people holding a snack — anything from a bag of chips to an apple — close to their chest, closing their eyes and waiting for their body to naturally lean forward or backward.
Proponents contend that a forward lean means the food is good for you, while leaning back means it’s a no-go.
“It’s a super effective way to communicate with your subconscious to see what’s going on in your body,” Jessy Pearson, a certified emotion code practitioner and self-described muscle testing expert, said in a TikTok.
Woman holding a jar of honey.
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Muscle testing fans claim it can help identify food allergies.
TikTok
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While applied kinesiology has grown in popularity over the last half century, experts say that the science doesn’t back it up.
“Through the years, many variations of this practice have suggested to be able to identify a wide variety of things, even diagnosing cancer,” Maryansky said.
“However, there have been multiple randomized controlled trials, reviews, and studies that have shown that there is no evidence that these practices have any validity to them,” he continued.
Not-so-subconscious
One of Maryansky’s biggest concerns with muscle testing is unconscious bias — a subtle influence that can totally skew results.
Scroll through TikTok’s #MuscleTesting videos, and you’ll see most people start with their eyes open, already knowing what food they’re testing.
Woman in a grocery store holding a bag of chips.
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Unconsious bias may skew the results of muscle testing.
TikTok
That, Maryansky said, triggers something called the “ideomotor phenomenon,” where tiny, unconscious muscle movements are driven by your thoughts and expectations.
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“If you know what the object you are holding is, you’ve already made a conscious decision on whether it is good or bad and your movements will respond accordingly,” he said.
In fact, Maryansky said that when testers are blindfolded, their muscle responses are about as reliable as a coin toss.
“The ideomotor phenomenon is the same principle behind why a Ouija board works and why you can feel the pointer move across the board even though you are not pushing it ‘on purpose,’” he explained.
But the underlying influences don’t stop there.
There are countless muscle testing variations. One popular TikTok version has a person hold a food item while extending an arm sideways, resisting downward pressure from a second person.
If the food’s “good,” the arm stays strong; if it’s “bad,” the arm weakens, and the tester can push it down.
Two women demonstrating muscle testing.
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Muscle testing evaluates muscle strength and response.
TikTok/
The problem, Maryansky said, is the person pushing on the arm brings their own biases to the table — unknowingly changing the force they apply based on what they expect the result to be.
“This is a different phenomenon called the observer-expectancy effect,” he said. “Blindfold this person too? And again, the amount the arm moves will become no better than random chance.”
When wellness goes wrong
Swaying in the supermarket might sound like innocent fun, Maryansky said it’s not an effective way to make choices about what to put in your body.
“It can be a dangerous practice because it bases ‘good’ or ‘bad’ on nothing but a subconscious response,” he said.
Woman holding a beer bottle in a kitchen.
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Doctors are warning against using muscle testing to guide supplement intake.
TikTok
The stakes get higher when people start using muscle testing to decide which supplements to take — and how much — a trend that’s all over TikTok.
“If a person was to hold a jar of poison and their arm response went to ‘good,’ well, it still wouldn’t be good for them,” Maryansky said.
“Using these practices to decide what foods to eat or what medications and supplements to take can wrongly make a person believe that they are doing what’s best for their body and end up making them very sick,” he added.
You can sway all day, but Maryansky said the smartest move is to talk to your doctor before making decisions about your diet and supplement intake.
“This type of practice is a good example of why researchers and physicians employ standardized and rigorous scientific methodology designed to remove secondary effects and unconscious bias when deciding whether or not something actually works,” he said.
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