The fear of missing out or fomo refers to the feeling or perception that others are having more fun, living better lives, or experiencing better things than you are. It involves a deep sense of envy and affects self-esteem. It is often exacerbated by social media sites like Instagram and Facebook.
Brief History of FOMO
The idea that you might be missing out on a good time is not new to our era. However, while it has presumably been around for centuries (you can see evidence of FOMO in ancient texts), it has only been studied during the past few decades, beginning with a 1996 research paper by marketing strategist, Dr. Dan Herman, who coined the term “fear of missing out.
Since the advent of social media, however, FOMO has become more obvious and has been studied more often. Social media has accelerated the FOMO phenomenon in several ways. It provides a situation in which you are comparing your regular life to the highlights of others’ lives.
Therefore, your sense of “normal” becomes skewed and you seem to be doing worse than your peers. You might see detailed photos of your friends enjoying fun times without you, which is something that people may not have been so readily aware of in past generations.
Social media creates a platform for bragging; it is where things, events, and even happiness itself seem to compete at times. People are comparing their best, picture-perfect experiences, which may lead you to wonder what you are lacking.
Social Networking Sites
Unsurprisingly, adolescents use social networking sites at a high rate and may experience FOMO as a result. Interestingly, however, FOMO acts as a mechanism that triggers higher social networking usage.
Girls experiencing depression tend to use social networking sites at a greater rate while, for boys, anxiety was a trigger for greater social media use.
This shows that increased use of social media can lead to higher stress rates caused by FOMO.
FOMO, age, and Gender
FOMO can be experienced by people of all ages, several studies have found. One study in the Psychiatry Research journal found that the fear of missing out was linked to a greater smartphone and social media usage and that this link was not associated with age or gender.
The research also found that both social media use and “problematic” smartphone usage was linked with a greater experience of FOMO. Smartphone usage was related to fears of negative and even positive evaluations by others as well as linked to negative effects on mood.
Potential Dangers of FOMO
Aside from increased feelings of unhappiness, the fear of missing out can lead to greater involvement in unhealthy behaviors. For example, the same study in Computers and Human Behavior found that FOMO was linked to distracted driving, which in some cases can be deadly.
Minimizing FOMO
Fortunately, steps can be taken to curb your FOMO if it is something you experience.
Research shows that a fear of missing out can stem from unhappiness and dissatisfaction with life and that these feelings can propel us into greater social media usage.
In turn, greater engagement with social media can make us feel worse about ourselves and our lives, not better. In this way, it helps to know that our attempts to alleviate feelings of FOMO can lead to behaviors that exacerbate it. Understanding where the problem lies, however, can be a great first step in overcoming it. The following can help.
Change Your Focus
Rather than focusing on what you lack, try noticing what you have. This is easier said than done on social media, where we may be bombarded with images of things we do not have, but it can be done. Add more positive people to your feed; hide people who tend to brag too much or who are not supportive of you.
You can change your feed to show you less of what triggers your FOMO and more of what makes you feel good about yourself. Work on identifying what may be sapping your joy online. Work to minimize these as you add more to your feed (and life) that makes you happy.
Keep a Journal
It is common to post on social media to keep a record of the fun things you do. However, you may find yourself noticing a little too much about whether people are validating your experiences online. If this is the case, you may want to take some of your photos and memories offline and keep a personal journal of your best memories, either online or on paper.
Keeping a journal can help you to shift your focus from public approval to private appreciation of the things that make your life great. This shift can sometimes help you to get out of the cycle of social media and FOMO.
Seek out Real Connections
You may find yourself seeking a greater connection when you are feeling depressed or anxious, and this is healthy. Feelings of loneliness or exclusion are our brain’s way of telling us that we want to seek out greater connections with others and increase our sense of belonging.
Unfortunately, social media engagement is not always the way to accomplish this—you might be running from one bad situation right into an even worse one. Rather than trying to connect more with people on social media, why not arrange to meet up with someone in person?
Making plans with a good friend, creating a group outing, or doing anything social that gets you out with friends can be a nice change of pace, and it can help you to shake that feeling that you are missing out. It puts you in the center of the action.
If you do not have time to make plans, even a direct message on social media to a friend can foster a greater and more intimate connection than posting to all of your friends and hoping for “likes”.
Focus on Gratitude
Studies show that engaging in gratitude-enhancing activities like gratitude journaling or simply telling others what you appreciate about them can lift your spirits as well as those of everyone around you.
This is partly because it is harder to feel as if you lack the things you need in life when you are focused on the abundance you already have. It also holds because making others feel good makes us feel good.
A lift in mood may be just what you need to relieve yourself of feeling depressed or anxious. You likely will not feel as tempted to go down the rabbit hole of social networking and FOMO when you realize how much you already have. You will begin to feel that you have what you need in life and so do other people. This can be wonderful for your mental and emotional health.
Resources:verywellmind.com
