From Posts to Patterns: Early Detection of Anorexia on Reddit

From Posts to Patterns: Early Detection of Anorexia on Reddit | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Research Article From Posts to Patterns: Early Detection of Anorexia on Reddit Sourav Saini, Procheta Sen This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-7609641/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Published Journal Publication published 10 Jan, 2026 Read the published version in Discover Computing → Version 1 posted 12 You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Rates of mental health concerns are rising, and an increasing number of individuals openly share their experiences on social media platforms. This openness creates an opportunity to study, detect, and ultimately support those at risk using data-driven methods. We focus on 'Anorexia Nervosa', an eating disorder characterized by persistent restriction and an intense fear of weight gain. Early, automatic identification can enable timelier assessment and intervention. We propose a transformer-based time-series model that analyzes longitudinal Reddit activity to estimate an individual’s likelihood of Anorexia. The model jointly captures temporal dynamics (how signals evolve over time) and semantic content (what the posts mean), yielding an accuracy of 85.2%. In our experiments, this approach outperforms baselines that rely solely on semantic features, underscoring the value of modeling user trajectories rather than treating posts in isolation. We further conduct post-hoc explanation analyses to highlight the features most responsible for the model’s predictions, and we show that these attributions align with human intuition. Application of AI in Mental Health Timeseries Transformers Full Text Additional Declarations No competing interests reported. Cite Share Download PDF Status: Published Journal Publication published 10 Jan, 2026 Read the published version in Discover Computing → Version 1 posted Editorial decision: Revision requested 27 Nov, 2025 Reviews received at journal 24 Nov, 2025 Reviewers agreed at journal 24 Nov, 2025 Reviews received at journal 23 Nov, 2025 Reviewers agreed at journal 22 Nov, 2025 Reviews received at journal 21 Nov, 2025 Reviewers agreed at journal 17 Nov, 2025 Reviewers invited by journal 14 Nov, 2025 Editor invited by journal 13 Nov, 2025 Editor assigned by journal 18 Sep, 2025 Submission checks completed at journal 18 Sep, 2025 First submitted to journal 13 Sep, 2025 You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. 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Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-7609641","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Research Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":550005020,"identity":"4e608bc6-35c1-42be-89fc-cdd487c77682","order_by":0,"name":"Sourav Saini","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"Indian Institute of Technology Jammu","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Sourav","middleName":"","lastName":"Saini","suffix":""},{"id":550005021,"identity":"21254bab-f00c-47ce-8088-45d3b7f51621","order_by":1,"name":"Procheta Sen","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAABFklEQVRIiWNgGAWjYJACZjjrQ4EElFWAJoOpxQDMYJxhANNiQKQWZh4DmBgeLebShw9+Lqj4I8/Af/jYYxsDi8R+6bMHH3wwYJDnb+AxNsCixbIvLVl6xhkDwwaJtHTjHAOJxJl9ecmGMwwYDGcc4DFOwKLF4AyPGTNvmwFjgwSPmTRQizFIRBroQsYNDDzGB3Bq+Wdg38B//pu0BVCLPVSLPX4tDQaJDQw5bNIMBhJyBjwQLYkgLdgcZtnDlizNc8w4uU0izUyyB6hF4gwfyC8SyTMOsxVj8745D/PBzzw1crb9/IefSfyoqOPh7+EFhliFjW1/e/NmCSxa4MawIcR4QIQEzojEZjMPdqWjYBSMglEwYgEAC3pLvoV9I0EAAAAASUVORK5CYII=","orcid":"","institution":"University of Liverpool","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Procheta","middleName":"","lastName":"Sen","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2025-09-13 22:53:06","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":"","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-7609641/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-7609641/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[{"content":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10791-026-09903-3","type":"published","date":"2026-01-10T15:57:15+00:00"}],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":96754751,"identity":"39066b5f-2478-4838-8160-c3f6560b0377","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-11-25 17:40:49","extension":"json","order_by":0,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":3954,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"a770192b451f453891687bb5043a639c.json","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-7609641/v1/a9f4fbec9bfabd222a70b898.json"},{"id":100069627,"identity":"ae990c1d-2390-4937-b64b-d11f0c340be5","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-12 16:15:01","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":768135,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"eRiskReportupdated3.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-7609641/v1_covered_b6c79c66-c1db-4c49-a014-b42643625dbf.pdf"}],"financialInterests":"No competing interests reported.","formattedTitle":"From Posts to Patterns: Early Detection of Anorexia on Reddit","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":false,"hideJournal":false,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":true,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"discover-computing","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"Learn more about [Discover Computing](https://link.springer.com/journal/10791)","snPcode":"10791","submissionUrl":"https://submission.springernature.com/new-submission/10791/3","title":"Discover Computing","twitterHandle":"","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":true,"editorialSystem":"stoa","reportingPortfolio":"Discover Series","inReviewEnabled":true,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"Application of AI in Mental Health, Timeseries, Transformers","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-7609641/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-7609641/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"Rates of mental health concerns are rising, and an increasing number of individuals openly share their experiences on social media platforms. 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