Social and exclusion phobia: What is FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out)?
FOMO, a term bandied about among young people, is a social phenomenon related to the digitisation of everyday life
It stands for Fear Of Missing Out, which corresponds to the fear of missing out or not participating in a pleasant and rewarding experience involving acquaintances or friends.
How to recognise FOMO
The main feeling attributable to FOMO is that others lead more fulfilling lives than we do.
FOMO is defined by 2 main elements
- anxiety about the possibility that others may have pleasurable experiences in which the subject does not participate;
- desire to be constantly in contact with others via social networks, compulsively checking social networks and any notifications.
The second element is somewhat of a consequence of the first and is related to the need to constantly research what others are doing and what one is missing.
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Who can be affected
It affects young people and adults alike, but male adolescents are the most affected.
The fear of being excluded in adolescence is physiological; any boy not invited to a party can experience a feeling of unease and discomfort.
We speak of FOMO, and the phenomenon becomes pathological, when this feeling of discomfort impacts on the individual’s daily functioning.
How FOMO arises
FOMO has always existed, even before the advent of digital technology. Today, however, there are many more opportunities to experience it because we are constantly exposed to the experience of others.
It is as if our lives are constantly on display, as well as the lives of others.
Everything has exploded more with the creation of Instagram stories that allow for a daily report of other people’s lives within 24 hours of being posted: this involves constant monitoring of the social and the smartphone.
FOMO arises, therefore, from the inability to participate in activities shared by friends and acquaintances; in other cases, however, it can arise without involving others.
In this case, the fear of being excluded stems from the fact that there are too many choices of how to spend one’s free time.
If there are so many options to choose from, this can lead to the perception that the experiences other people are having are better and more interesting.
The individual loses a sense of reality and relies on the interpretation of social network posts.
The freedom of choice, and therefore the presence of more options, generates in the individual with FOMO the feeling of not having made the best choice, leaving a sense of anxiety and inadequacy.
Symptoms of FOMO
FOMO is closely related to smartphone addiction and is characterised by:
- compulsive hyper-control of the smartphone;
- need to be constantly connected;
- inability to refrain from reading notifications.
It is characterised by the need to constantly update web pages and, from a cognitive point of view, FOMO is characterised by obsessive thoughts about being connected.
Only when this need becomes constant and extreme can it lead to pathological conditions:
- social anxiety;
- high levels of stress:
- dissatisfaction;
- insomnia;
- anxious depressive symptoms.
The causes
Studies that have been conducted on FOMO show that the causes are to be found in the attempt to satisfy one of the basic needs of human beings: sociability.
The attempt to satisfy this need can lead to overuse of social networks.
Those who do not feel sufficiently connected to others make use of new technologies on a compensatory level.
Therefore, people who underestimate their lives and have low self-esteem are more likely to develop FOMO.
How to prevent or treat FOMO
We must first of all remember that on social media we tend to overestimate the happiness and success of others.
We do not see the real condition of the other person, but we see what others want us to see.
It is physiological to have regrets, to be indecisive and to be afraid of having made a wrong choice.
FOMO can therefore be counteracted through:
- mindfulness of the present: those who live in fear of losing something are as if they were always projected into the future or the past, they find it hard to stay in the here and now. Mindfulness meditation exercises are therefore an advisable and viable path for all people;
- reduce social confrontation;
- learning to accept feelings of loneliness: loneliness is not necessarily something we need to escape or run away from, but dedicating time to it is the first step to acquiring greater autonomy.
Finally, we can say that an antithesis to the word FOMO has been created, namely JOMO, joy of missing out.
The key to countering this growing phenomenon among young people is to accept reality for what it is, to live in the moment without the anxiety of missing out on something.
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