FOMO is commonly referred to as "fear of missing out." According to Christina (2019), FOMO is what a person needs to know about other people's activities. The state in which a person views other people's activities more than their own is known as Fear of Missing Out (FOMO). FOMO is any activity done to stay connected to other people's activities (Christina 2019). The highest level of FOMO is something that makes a person afraid of missing out on using the internet, especially social media for adolescents who are transitioning into early adulthood (Przybylski et al., 2014). FOMO is also known as the fear of being left behind from all the experiences and activities of others and a position where a person values other people's activities more than their own.
b. Factors that Influence and Impact of FOMO for Adolescents
Adolescence is a transitional period from childhood to early adulthood. (Gumantan, Mahfud, et al., 2021). Adolescence is a transition between childhood and early adulthood which causes changes in physical, cognitive, emotional, and psychosocial. (Fahrizqi et al., n.d). In early adulthood, adolescents are required to be able to make the transition to be able to achieve adult social goals. One of the things that is difficult to do is adaptation in the social environment. On the other hand, technological developments are also developing rapidly so that adolescents find it difficult to avoid the development of circulating technology, one of which is social media. Social media has an influence on adolescents, namely identity crisis. With the creation of social media, teenagers are made to have high curiosity, always want to explore themselves in new things, and are easily attracted to their friends. In fact, individuals who do not have high curiosity, do not always want to explore themselves in new things, and are not easily attracted to their friends have a freer spirit in expressing their opinions. In addition, adolescents also consider social media as a place to maintain social relationships and tend to rely on social media to fulfil their social needs (Lee & Chiou, 2013).
Factors that influence FOMO in adolescents
In a journal entitled "Social Media and Fear of Missing Out Scale Development and Assessment" says that the basis of FOMO is when individuals feel lost, someone who easily experiences feelings of irritability, anxiety, and inadequacy. Inadequacy is often seen as shame, which is an occurrence where a person views themselves as inferior in some way (Seu, 2006). Feelings of inadequacy can lead to low self-esteem. On the other hand, feelings of inferiority can lead to petty resentment, irritability, and rudeness (Buss and Durkee, 1957). In addition, anxiety is related to FOMO. Anxiety can make individuals feel left behind because they cannot do what they are seeing.Â
The impact of FOMO on adolescents
According to the journal "The Impact of FOMO Syndrome on Social Interaction in Youth" states that FOMO syndrome has a bad impact on adolescents, namely the lack of social interaction with their peers. Research conducted by the Australian psychology professional organisation found that teenagers spend 2.7 hours per day on social media and significantly more teenagers experience the FOMO phenomenon than adults. It is also true that FOMO has a significant adverse impact, namely losing useful experiences from others and anxiety symptoms. And according to research by Francis and Newman (2016) Fears of Missing Out cause sleep deprivation especially in students.
c. Social Media as One of the Things that Affect FOMO in Adolescents
Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is one of the phenomena that arise in social media users. Anxiety about losing precious moments of an individual or group where the individual is not present in it and is characterised by a desire to stay connected to what others are doing through the internet or cyberspace can be called FOMO. In short, the phenomenon of a person's desire to stay connected to others is the definition of FOMO (Juliana, 2023). Miller (2012) suggests that a person will feel left behind if he constantly follows updates from other people's lives on social media and compares his life with others on social media. He sees other people's updates such as parties, fancy dinners, and brilliant careers and can cause self dissatisfaction, anxiety, and feelings of worthlessness (Sulistianti & Sugiarta, 2022). The negative effects of fear of missing out (FOMO) according to Setiad and Agus (in Salwanisa, 2023) are depression and low self-confidence. This is caused by excessive use of social media.
Fear of missing out (FOMO) is dissatisfaction with one's life, a desire to use devices while walking or driving, neglecting one's personal life and focusing too much on the lives of others on social media, experiencing sleep interruptions, and not being able to fully enjoy being together in the real world. Anxiety and worry if they have not checked social media as well as obsession with the actions of others and fear that they cannot exist on social media can be caused by FOMO (Bee, 2016). Based on research, there is a significant influence between FOMO behaviour in adolescents and the intensity of social media use. In addition, cyber bullying behaviour is also influenced by social media intensity and FOMO behaviour. The higher the intensity of social media use, the higher the FOMO behaviour. Conversely, the lower the intensity of social media use, the lower the FOMO behaviour (Azizah & Zahid, 2023).Â
Being accepted and connected with peers is important during adolescence (Desjarlais & Willoughby, 2010). Therefore, adolescents are keen to access social media to satisfy their need to belong to a social group. However, anxiety may occur when they feel they are missing out on important experiences with their friends (Oberst, Wegmann, Stodt, Brand, & Chamarro, 2017). Therefore, teenagers will tend to continue to access social media to get the latest news. Meanwhile, according to Song, Zhang, Zhao, & Song (2017) FOMO in the context of social media on smartphones is a social phenomenon that makes a number of smartphone users check their smartphones frequently and fixate on the applications in them. They want to get certain experiences from smartphones constantly. However, if these needs are not fulfilled, they will feel anxious, uncomfortable, depressed, confused, feel lacking, and others.
