The new trend of the orange peel theory has been going viral in the past couple months, as Gen Z has been doing this little test to challenge their partners and relationships. What is this test? When did it become a trend? And does it really have a value?

A new trend has been taking the platform, TikTok, by storm the past couple months, called the “orange peel theory.” The orange peel theory, according to the TikTok user @annabahmm, is when a “partner performs tiny acts of service for you, especially the ones you can do yourself.” Another TikTok user @neanotmia broke the trend down by saying, “It may not be about the orange peeling itself. They are asking to see your reaction, to see if later they can ask for big favors. How you are going to make them feel if they ask for your help?” In other words, the orange peel theory is about small acts of services and if your partner is willing to do them and if they are, it is an indicator that the relationship is healthy.

The trend showed many users on the platform performing this test and how their partners responded to this and acted without giving it much thought, but there are still some criticisms of this trend. A lot of creators on the platform also posted responses to these videos saying that just because a partner does these little tasks does not mean that they are a good partner and if the partner does not want to participate and purposely fails said task does that mean that the person is not a good partner? There are some videos where some of the partners are being harsh on camera and a lot of comments under the post are saying things like “I would not have posted this.”

That is to say that using a trend to judge a relationship is by no means a good idea as not everyone expresses their love in the same way. Failing the orange peel theory test should not be an indicator of whether or not a relationship is healthy or not, as it is not a marker of a healthy relationship.