FoMO, but not self-compassion, moderates the link between social media use and anxiety in adolescence

ABSTRACT

Objective

Social media use is ubiquitous during adolescence, and emerging research suggests an association with anxiety symptoms in some individuals. Two psychological constructs which may moderate this relationship are Fear of Missing Out (FoMO) and self-compassion. Higher FoMO tendencies may exacerbate the link between social media use and anxiety symptoms through greater fixation on social comparison, whereas higher self-compassion may weaken this link. The purpose of this study was to examine whether FoMO and self-compassion independently moderate the relationship between social media use and anxiety symptoms in adolescents.

Method

Participants included 951 adolescents (M_age = 13.69, SD = 0.72; 54% male). Online questionnaires assessed frequency of social media use, anxiety symptoms, FoMO, and self-compassion.

Results

FoMO moderated the relationship between social media use and anxiety, ΔR² = .022, ΔF(1,945) = 26.26, p < .001. Increased social media use was associated with increased anxiety symptoms in adolescents high in FoMO and reduced anxiety for adolescents low in FoMO. Self-compassion was not a significant moderator.

Conclusion

These findings have implications for social media use, public guidelines and clinical practice and support adoption of a discerning approach to adolescent’s social media use.

KEY POINTS

What is already known about this topic:

1. Whilst some studies demonstrate an association between social media use and anxiety, depression or self harm, other studies suggest social media is beneficial to wellbeing.

2. Previous research suggests that Fear of Missing out mediates the association between anxiety and social media use.

3. Self compassion is associated with less time spent on social media.

What this topic adds:

1. This study identified students who are adversely affectedby social media use amongst Australian adolescents and differentiated them from students who derive some benefit from social media use.

2. Students who were concerned by a fear of missing out showed that social media use was associated with increased levels of anxiety. Incontrast, for students who were not concerned with missing out, increased social media use was associated with reduced levels of anxiety.

3. Self-compassion did not moderate the association between increased social media use and anxiety symptoms.

KEYWORDS:

• Social media
• FoMO
• self-compassion
• anxiety
• adolescence

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Prof Ron Rapee, Prof Peter McEvoy, Dr Anne McMaugh, Dr Eyal Karin, Miriam Capper, Ass/Prof Maree Abbott and Prof Warren Mansell for their collaboration on the larger research project: “Targeting Intolerance of Uncertainty in youth”. Special thanks to Dr Mark Griffin for his contribution to the analysis used in the current study and to the schools, Wellbeing Teachers and School Executive staff for their assistance with data collection and partial funding of the research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data underlying this article are available in the Macquarie University Repository and can be accessed with https://doi.org/10.25949/20188298.v1.

Open Scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open Science badges for Open Data and Open Materials through Open Practices Disclosure. The data and materials are openly accessible at https://doi.org/10.25949/20188298.v1.

Supplementary data

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/00049530.2023.2217961.

Notes

1. The Australian Bureau of Statistics noted that 41.3% of females and 21.4% of males aged between 16 and 24 years had experienced an anxiety disorder in the 12 month period of 2020 to 2021. This was over the Covid pandemic. These were the highest rates of all age groups. The rates previously collected by the ABS when asked if they were suffering from an anxiety disorder aged between 15 and 24 years were: females 2014 to 2015 18.9% 2017 to 2018 24.6%; males 2014 to 2015 7.9% 2017 to 2018 13.9%.

Additional information

Funding

This research was approved by the Human Research Ethics Committee (Medical Sciences) at Macquarie University 5201500115 and the Human Research Ethics Committee at Australian Catholic University 2016-197 R. The work was supported by the Independent schools.