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Ryan Lee

Jung Soo Lee

Writing 39C

27 November 2019

Parenting: An Individualized Approach to FOMO

FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) is anxiety resulting from people worrying that they are

missing out on social activities that their peers engage in. This anxiety causes people to compare

their social lives to those of others, often resulting in perceived social inadequacy due to the

negative thoughts a person develops about themself. FOMO1 is a widespread issue that continues

to become more problematic as social media's influence expands. However, it is a tricky problem

to regulate, as legislation does not directly address such new issues as FOMO at a pace fast

enough to keep up with the numerous developments in cyberspace as a whole. Additionally, it is

difficult to determine whether legislation is truly effective in their methods of limiting social

media use, as numerous loopholes in mediating media usage exist, such as the use of different

accounts, devices, etc. Therefore, this paper will provide an overview of the reason legislation

would not be the best solution, along with the most optimal current solution: parenting.

The issue of social media facilitating FOMO is not one to be overlooked, it is a serious

problem that stems from the way the adolescent brain works. Research has shown that social

media activates the same responses in the brain as other addictive activities, such as gambling,

1
In this article, I will be discussing FOMO in terms of social media use by adolescents, and
resulting negative feelings, such as depression, etc. For more context on FOMO's influence and
symptoms, verywell mind's article, "​How to Deal With FOMO in Your Life" briefly summarizes
the issue.
https://www.verywellmind.com/how-to-cope-with-fomo-4174664
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drawing a connection to social media and addiction (Kelly McSweeney, 1). The connections to

gambling and social media usage may seem exaggerated, but their implications match exactly

with the rise in excessive social media use. This issue particularly applies to unhappy people who

use social media in an attempt to improve their mood. Because unhappy people generally crave

immediate gratification, they are prone to falling victim to the addictive nature of social media.

Because their brains receive feelings of happiness while using social media, they are likely to

come back to it, despite later feelings of increased FOMO. Given the scientific data proving that

social media is indeed addictive, this concern is further exacerbated by studies proving that

adolescents value risk over reward in making decisions. Research studies show that adolescents'

prefrontal cortex (area of the brain that exercises self-control and judgment) is less developed

than that of adults, making them prone to engaging in risky behavior that could result in

perceived social rewards (Hooper, et. al, 1). This paired along with the addicting nature proves

how difficult it is for an adolescent to stop using social media, and demonstrates the severity of

the issue. It also points to why parents are the current optimal solution to FOMO being so

widespread, they have the ability to restrict how much social media adolescents use, and can

serve as a supportive person to guide them through emotional turmoil. Parents can also help

teens consider the consequences of excessive social media usage, something they are not

generally scientifically predisposed to do. Because they have the experience and ability to judge

the situation from an experienced perspective, parents can illustrate to their kids not only the fact

that social media is an inaccurate representation of the lives of others, but the consequences of

believing this to be true that will affect their own perception of themselves.
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Considering the prevalence and seriousness of FOMO amongst adolescents, parents are

by no means a perfect solution, but they far outweigh the realistic capabilities of legislative

action to solve the issue of FOMO. Here, we examine an instance of South Korea's government

attempting to limit the media consumption that people under 16 years old could have. The law,

commonly referred to as the shutdown law, aims to lessen gaming addiction by restricting

children under 16 from playing online games after midnight (​Jiyeon Lee, 1​). However, the law

has not only been contested as a violation of the rights of affected people, but has proven to have

many loopholes in terms of what the law aims to achieve. Most notably, the law only applies to

online games, having no influence over console games which do not require an internet

connection to play. Additionally, the law can be bypassed when teens make an account and claim

to be above the age limit. Clearly the law could not address every way that games could be

played, and overall failed to provide quantifiable data to prove the effectiveness of such action.

Though the issue discussed in this paper is FOMO in relation to social media usage, this

example holds many similarities to it. This is an illustration of what would likely happen if

legislation attempted to restrict social media time for adolescents. In summary, loopholes would

essentially render the legislation ineffective and immeasurable in terms of success, the law would

be met with fierce opposition for violation of human rights (moreso in America), and would fail

to restrict every method in which social media could be consumed. This example illustrates the

limits of legislation; it can make laws in an attempt to solve a problem, but cannot address every

way the rule could be bypassed, and would likely be made far after the underlying issue has

already become widespread and serious. This strengthens my argument that despite the obvious
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limitations to parental intervention in their childrens' feelings of FOMO, it is the current best

solution to the issue in the face of ineffective and slow legislative processes.

Parental mediation is arguably the best way to reduce instances of FOMO, however it too

has its flaws. Some parents are too busy to effectively monitor their teenagers' social media

usage, therefore the solution cannot become a standard for every person experiencing FOMO.

Additionally, busy parents may struggle to keep up with the many new updates and forms of

social media2, which further complicates the ability for them to effectively help their teens.

However, the biggest issue in parental mediation is its lack of standardization. Some parents may

be strict on the issue, while others may take a lenient and ineffective approach to the problem.

Similarly, issues of parents being literate in media and understanding the complexities of it are

factors that can hinder parental abilities. It is difficult to even find statistics on the number of

media literate parents, further illustrating how complex media can become, and the difficulties of

quantifying parental media literacy and what constitutes such a term. Additionally, with few

statistics on parental media literacy, it would be difficult to standardize what parents should be

taught and how to keep up with new trends. Though solutions such as media literacy classes

could be implemented for parents, busy ones would not have the time or energy to attend such

classes, and generally many parents would not be predisposed to attend them, as they are time

consuming and would possibly cost money. With these issues, it becomes difficult to determine

how parents should be educated, and then the most cost-effective way. Perhaps the media could

address the issue more prominently and bring public awareness to the issue. But even then, news

2
This article contains 21 social media sites (both new and old) that will be prominent in 2020.
The purpose of this is to illustrate the overwhelming amount of social media outlets that parents
would be expected to keep up with.
https://www.mobileappdaily.com/best-social-media-apps
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outlets or other potential ways to bring attention to the issue would need a financial incentive to

address it, presenting more problems that are out of the scope of the proposed solution in this

paper.

However, despite the inherent flaws of parental mediation, it has the greatest potential of

any method to be the most effective at mediating FOMO. Parents know their children best, and

generally have a good idea of what would work best in terms of achieving their goal of reducing

FOMO allowing them to customize their approach to best suit the individual differences of each

child. Different approaches towards handling an adolescent's experience with FOMO stem from

a parent's bond with their child, and the level of involvement they play in their childrens' lives.

The ability of parents to cater their parenting style to their child depending on personality,

temperament, and many other factors is what not only strengthens a bond, but allows their

parental authority to be more effective (Omer, et. al, 10-11). From this study, it is clear that the

ability for parents to customize their approach to parenting is crucial to developing a bond with

their children that will allow them to better understand their child and address the issue of

limiting social media usage in a way that best suits the child's individual tendencies. The

individualized attention and knowledge of their kids that parents can provide cannot be matched

by that of any legislative action.

With this in mind, parents should pick the strategy they see best suited towards being

successful for their child. General solutions would be to limit social media usage or explain to

their kids why social media is a glorified depiction of the lives of people who post. Adjustments

to these solutions could be made, or even entirely different strategies could be created. No matter

the method used, the steps towards success remain the same: to not only choose the best option
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to solve a child's FOMO, but to be involved in their child's life and see that their efforts are

successful. It is easy to simply implement a rule in an effort to solve the issue with little effort,

but the true route to success is to see it through and see that children actually understand or

believe in the efforts a parent is making. By fostering a relationship where the child understands

the intentions of a parent and respects the amount of time and dedication a parent takes to do

this, the child believes in the cause and fittingly puts in more effort to try and follow their

parent's guidance. However, this too is a socioeconomic issue, as some parents lack the time

necessary to invest in their children's mental health; this does not invalidate the overall idea of

the solution, it simply makes it infeasible for some.

To further support this solution, studies in parental mediation of adolescent's feelings of

FOMO have shown that families who communicate with adolescents reduce the severity of such

feelings. However, it should be noted that even in communicative families, these feelings were

high in adolescents who engaged in excessive social media usage, which reduced the time spent

with family (Favotto, et. al, 9). This study proves that parental communication can mediate

FOMO, however, it does indicate that media usage should be restricted in order to effectively

mediate the feelings of FOMO. With this in mind, it is clear that parents should not only act as a

support resource for their teenagers experiencing FOMO, but should limit the amount of time

spent on social media platforms. The teenagers who excessively use social media likely crave

feelings of social interactivity, which they supplement with social media use. However this

would exacerbate their already negative feelings and could culminate into symptoms of FOMO.

Given the great potential of parental influence, naturally the question of how effective

their influence truly is will arise. Studies have shown that parents who can strike a balance
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between maintaining a loving relationship and a sensible amount of control over their childrens'

lives have the best outcomes with their children, allowing them greater influence over their

children (​Grusec, et. al, 1​). This further strengthens the idea of parents taking an involved and

carefully catered approach to addressing their childrens' issues. Parents who actively seek to

individualize their approach to moderating their children generally have effective authority.

Given this information, it is clear that the ability of parents to serve as the answer to the issue of

FOMO is not an end-all answer. It is simply the solution that has the most potential to reach the

most people in various ways.

In conclusion, the issue of FOMO presents itself as a severe problem that has no easy

solution. Legislative action would likely either be too late or have loopholes that could easily be

bypassed by social media users. In addition to these issues, parents often are not media literate

enough to even know what they want legislation to do to solve the problem, therefore leaving the

issue up to lawmakers who may not be media literate or quick to solve the issue. Given this,

parents would be the best-but not perfect-solution. They know what would work best in

moderating their kids' social media consumption, they know how they would react to such

restrictions, and they can provide a level of individual customization and care that legislative

action simply cannot match. This solution would do more than reduce FOMO through social

media use, it would promote a culture of parental initiative in childrens' lives and help strengthen

bonds between parents and children. The resulting change in parenting culture would help

parents take action against other issues faced by their children, such as bullying, stress, etc.

Though none of the additional perks of better parenting can be foreseen with absolute certainty,

what is certain is that parental initiative in the lives of their children will undoubtedly lead to
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good things for both children and parents. Relationships will grow, parents would become

increasingly dedicated and proactive in their children's lives, and numerous unforeseen benefits

would arise from improved parental relations. With a parenting culture promoting the growth of

mentally healthy children, society as a whole would benefit from healthy people, who could not

only become productive citizens, but promote a culture of overall well-being.

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Works Cited

Favotto, Lindsay, et al. “The Role of Family and Computer-Mediated Communication in

Adolescent Loneliness.” Plos One, vol. 14, no. 6, 2019,

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0214617.

Grusec, Joan E., and Tanya Danyliuk. “Parenting Skills: Parents' Attitudes and Beliefs: Their

Impact on Children's Development.” ​Encyclopedia on Early Childhood Development,​

Dec. 2014,

www.child-encyclopedia.com/parenting-skills/according-experts/parents-attitudes-and

-beliefs-their-impact-childrens-development.

Hooper, Catalina J., et al. “Adolescents' Performance on the Iowa Gambling Task: Implications

for the Development of Decision Making and Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex.”

Developmental Psychology,​ vol. 40, no. 6, 2004, pp. 1148–1158.,

doi:10.1037/0012-1649.40.6.1148.

Lee, Jiyeon. “South Korea Pulls Plug on Late-Night Adolescent Online Gamers.” ​CNN,​

Cable News Network, 22 Nov. 2011,

www.cnn.com/2011/11/22/world/asia/south-korea-gaming/index.html.

Manager, Vikram Content. “Best 21 Social Media Apps That Will Rule in 2020.”

MobileAppAaily,​ MobileAppDaily, 23 Nov. 2017,

www.mobileappdaily.com/best-social-media-apps.

McSweeney, Kelley, et al. “The Intersection of Technology, Innovation & Creativity.” ​Now.

Powered by Northrop Grumman,​ 17 Mar. 2019,

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now.northropgrumman.com/this-is-your-brain-on-instagram-effects-of-social-media-on-t

he-brain/.

Scott, Elizabeth. “Do You Have FOMO? Here Is How to Cope.” ​Verywell Mind​, Verywell Mind,

26 Nov. 2019, www.verywellmind.com/how-to-cope-with-fomo-4174664.