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Social and emotional correlates of the fear of missing out

Article in North American Journal of Psychology · June 2018

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 Social and Emotional Correlates of the Fear of
Missing Out
Blaine L. Browne1
Mara S. Aruguete2
Lynn E. McCutcheon3
Anna Marie Medina4
Valdosta State University1
Lincoln University of Missouri2
Editor, NAJP3
Gonzaga University4

This study compares and validates measures of the “fear of missing out”
(FoMO). We administered two measures of the fear of missing out
(FoMO Abel & FoMOPrzy), the Positive and Negative Affect Scales
(PANAS), the Need to Belong Scale (NBS), the Rejection Sensitivity
Questionnaire (RSQ), the Acceptance and Action Questionnaire – II
(AAQ-II), and the Entertainment-Social subscale of the Celebrity Attitude
Scale (CAS ES) to 286 university students to determine how well scores
on each scale would correlate with scores on the two measures of FoMO.
We found that scores on all but the CAS ES correlated significantly with
scores on both FoMO scales. Results support construct validity for both
FoMO scales, although one measure appears to provide a more specific
assessment of the fear of missing out.

Researchers define the fear of missing out (FoMO) as “a general

apprehension that others are having more rewarding experiences than you
are” (Przybylski, Muryama, DeHaan, & Gladwell, 2013, p. 1841), and
the uneasy feeling that your peers are doing, possessing, and learning
things that you are not (Abel, Buff, & Burr, 2016). Newspapers, letters,
radio, and pictures have long enhanced the fear of missing out on
important and interesting events (Wortham, 2011), but technological
improvements in communication (e.g., social media) have made
receiving information about others more addictive than ever (Abel et al.,
2016). As people in the Western world have become more attached to
social media, the need for increased understanding of its impact grows.
In particular, both research and theory highlight the need to examine the
relation between technological advances and the experience of FoMO.
________________________________
Author info: Correspondence should be sent to: Dr. Blaine Browne, Psychology
Department, 1500 N. Patterson, St., Valdosta State University, Valdosta, GA
31698
North American Journal of Psychology, 2018, Vol. 20, No. 2, 341-354.
 NAJP
342 NORTH AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY

Research on FoMO reveals that nearly 70% of adults experience some

degree of FoMO (JWT Intelligence, 2012), and that some components of
FoMO - notably irritability, anxiety, and feelings of inadequacy (Abel et
al., 2016) - are exacerbated by visits to social media websites (Wortham,
2011). FoMO may be a source of negative affect and general unhappiness
because it suggests that one has not made good life decisions (Przybylski
et al, 2013).
In a related vein, investigators have focused recently on celebrity
worshipers, persons who express a great deal of admiration for their
favorite celebrity and other celebrities as well (Griffith, Aruguete,
Edman, Green, & McCutcheon, 2013; McCutcheon, Maltby, Houran, &
Ashe, 2004). This line of inquiry led to the development of the
absorption-addiction model, a three-stage model that attempts to further
our understanding of how some persons gradually become addicted to
celebrities. The model postulates that people first become attracted to
celebrities because they entertain us and they grease the wheels of social
interaction. “Did you see X in that TV show last night? Wasn’t he
terrific?” Previous research has shown that about one-third of the adult
population could be described as having reached this first stage, called
Entertainment-Social (Maltby, Houran, & McCutcheon, 2003). A small
percentage of stage one persons eventually move to the more problematic
stage two, and a few stage two persons move on to the even more
problematic stage three. However, our main concern in the present study
is Stage 1 (the Entertainment-Social stage). Stage 1 is salient because it
appears to be related to apprehension about social events and friendships.
It seems reasonable to think that the fear of missing out might be linked
to the Entertainment-Social stage of celebrity worship. They share in
common a concern for social events, and the opportunity to avoid social
exclusion by communicating with friends about these events, of which
information about favorite celebrities is often an important part
(McCutcheon et al., 2004).
Belongingness theory (Baumeister & Leary, 1995) posits a powerful
need for humans to belong to groups. Furthermore, the loss of social
bonds is so painful that the fear of social exclusion motivates people to
conform to groups. The pressure to conform is often manifested in
attempts to share information about popular persons such as celebrities,
and the fear of being compared unfavorably with friends or even
ostracized if there is a failure to do so. Current research has also found
that FoMO is positively related to both social media use and the need to
belong (Beyens, Frison, & Eggermont, 2016).
There also seems to be an emotional component to FoMO, judging
from the social anxiety, irritability, and fear thought to underlie it (Abel
et al., 2016). Watson, Clark and Tellegen (1988) developed scales to
 Browne, Aruguete, McCutcheon, Medina CORRELATES OF FoMO 343

measure both positive and negative emotions that most people commonly
encounter. Given the social anxiety component of FoMO, this construct
also may be related to rejection sensitivity. Rejection sensitivity refers to
a trait-like, anxious expectation, perception, and overreaction to rejection
(Downey & Feldman, 1996, p. 1327). People high in rejection sensitivity
often express anxiety over the possibility of being told “no” in response
to requests for help from friends and relatives, and often expect to be
rejected in ambiguous social situations (Berenson et al., 2009). Anxiety
concerned with social relationships seems to be the common ingredient
for both FoMO and rejection sensitivity, so we hypothesize a positive
relation between the two. It is reasonable to assume that the social
anxiety, fear, and irritability thought to underlie FoMO would be related
to distress, though distress is not always due to social causes.
To more clearly establish the construct validity of FoMO, we
examined linkages among rejection sensitivity, need to belong, positive
and negative emotions, celebrity worship, and FoMO. Two measures of
FoMO are presently in use; both are 10-item scales with one developed
by Przybylski and colleagues (Przybylski et al., 2013), and the second
developed Abel and collaborators (Abel et al., 2016). We anticipated that
scores on both measures would be moderately, positively related with
scores of scales tapping the need to belong (Baumeister & Leary, 1995),
rejection sensitivity (Downey & Feldman, 1996) and other measures of
distress and negative affect (Bond et al., 2011; Watson et al., 1988). We
likewise expected that scores on the FoMO scales would be negatively
related to positive affect (Watson et al., 1988). In light of the absorption-
addiction model of celebrity worship, we further hypothesized that
persons high in FoMO will tend to be attracted to a favorite celebrity for
social reasons; that is, those high in FoMO will likewise score highly on a
measure of the centrality of celebrities to one’s social life.

METHOD
Participants
Participants were 291 students (99 males and one participant who did
not list gender) recruited from three universities located in the states of
Georgia, Missouri, and Washington. Five cases were removed due to
multiple skipped items on more than one questionnaire. Mean age of the
sample was 20.17 (SD = 3.45), with a range of 18 to 50 years. Ethnic
composition of the sample included 54.2% European-Americans, 32.9%
African-Americans, 5.6% Hispanic-Americans, 5.6% Asian-Americans,
and 1.7% other or declined to answer. We chose to recruit college-age
participants because college students have a strong focus on social
interaction and connecting with friends and family (Alt, 2015).
344 NORTH AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY

Measures
The Entertainment-Social subscale from the Celebrity Attitude Scale
(CAS ES; McCutcheon, et al, 2004). Sample items include "My friends
and I like to discuss what my favorite celebrity has done,” and “Learning
the life story of my favorite celebrity is a lot of fun." This subscale
reflects social and entertainment aspects of celebrity worship and is
consistent with Stever's (1991) and Rubin and McHugh’s (1987)
observation that fans are primarily attracted to their favorite celebrity
because of their perceived ability to entertain. The CAS ES is a 10-item
Likert scale with "strongly agree" equal to 5 and "strongly disagree"
equal to 1. It has good reliability and validity, and is unrelated to social
desirability (Griffith, et al, 2013; McCutcheon, Lange, & Houran, 2002;
McCutcheon, et al, 2004). For example, one recent study found a
Cronbach alpha of .89 for the 10 items that comprise the Entertainment-
Social subscale (McCutcheon, Gillen, Browne, Murtagh, & Collisson,
2016), while another found strong evidence for both internal consistency
and temporal reliability (Griffith et al., 2013). Cronbach’s alpha for the
ES subscale in the present study is .86.
The Positive and Negative Affect Scales (PANAS; Watson, Clark,
&Tellegen, 1988). These scales consist of 10 positive (“strong,”
“enthusiastic”) and 10 negative adjectives (“irritable,” “scared”).
Respondents are asked to indicate the “extent you generally feel this
way” on a scale ranging from 1 (very slightly or not at all) to 5
(extremely). The Beck Depression Inventory correlated .58 with the
Negative Affect Scale (NAS), and -.36 with the Positive Affect Scale
(PAS), as expected (Watson et al., 1988). Cronbach’s alphas were found
to be .87 and .88 respectively, and test-retest reliability with an 8-week
interval for the version we used was .71 for NAS and .68 for PAS
(Watson et al., 1988). Cronbach’s alphas for the NAS and PAS in the
present study are .84, and .81 respectively.
The Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (RSQ; Downey & Feldman,
1996). As recommended by the authors, we used an 8-item version of
this scale that featured the best items from their original 18-item version.
There are two parts to each item. The first part asks how concerned the
respondent would be about the response to a request for help that a
typical college student might make. The second part asks how the
respondent thinks the would-be helper would react. Scores on the first
part are scaled from 1 (very unconcerned) to 6 (very concerned); scores
on the second part are scaled from 1 (very unlikely) to 6 (very likely).
Each item score consists of the score on the second part subtracted from
the number 7, times the score on the first part. Consider this sample item:
“You ask a friend to do you a big favor.” Suppose a respondent answered
with a “5” on the first part and a “2” on the second part. Seven minus 2
 Browne, Aruguete, McCutcheon, Medina CORRELATES OF FoMO 345

equals 5, times 5 is 25. This would be a rather high score, and high scores
indicate high sensitivity to rejection. Each participant’s total score was
determined by adding the scores for each of the eight items, then dividing
by the number eight. The 18-item version had a Cronbach alpha of .83
and test-retest reliability of .78 over a four-month interval (Downey &
Feldman, 1996). The Cronbach alpha reliability for the 8-item version
used in the present study was .61. High scorers were more likely than low
scorers to feel rejected in ambiguous social situations, and more likely to
believe that their intimate partner desired to leave their relationship
(Downey & Feldman, 1996). In a later study, persons who were highly
sensitive to rejection were more likely to see their relationships break up
than persons who were low in rejection sensitivity (Downey, Freitas,
Michaelis, & Khouri, 1998).
The Acceptance and Action Questionnaire (AAQ – II; Bond et al.,
2011). This is a 7-item Likert-type scale with scores ranging from 1
(never true) to 7 (always true). Sample items include “Emotions cause
problems in my life” and “I’m afraid of my feelings.” High scores
indicate a person who has difficulty changing behavior in the pursuit of
goals or values depending on the situation (Bond et al., 2011). The scale
has a Cronbach alpha of .84 and a 12-month test-retest reliability
coefficient of .79. Cronbach’s alpha in the present study is .89. High
scores on the AAQ-II predicted psychological distress one year later, and
correlated .67 with PANAS - NA (Bond, et al, 2011). These findings led
to an investigation of the psychometric properties of the AAQ-II, the
results of which confirmed that it is actually a reasonably good measure
of psychological distress (Wolgast, 2014).
The Need to Belong Scale (NBS; Leary, Kelly, Cottrell, &
Schreindorfer, 2013). This 10-item Likert-type scale consists of items
like “I want other people to accept me,” and “I do not like being alone.”
Responses range from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Scores
for questions 1, 3, and 7 were reverse-scored. High scores indicate a
strong need to belong. The NBS has correlated positively with measures
of affiliation, sociability, and the desire to be accepted by specific people,
and correlated negatively with enjoyment of doing things alone. It did not
correlate with rejection sensitivity (Beekman, Stock, & Marcus, 2016) or
a measure of social avoidance and distress. The NBS in several studies
usually has Cronbach’s alphas above .80, and showed a test-retest
reliability of .87 with a 10-week interval (Leary et al., 2013). Cronbach’s
alpha in the present study is .81.
The Fear of Missing Out scale (FoMOPrzy). This 10-item scale was
developed by Przybylski et al. (2013). Hereafter we will call it
FoMOPrzy to avoid confusion with the other FoMO scale we used.
Scores range from 1 (Not at all true of me) to 5 (Extremely true of me).
346 NORTH AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY

Sample items include “I fear my friends have more rewarding

experiences than me” and “It bothers me when I miss an opportunity to
meet up with friends.” High scores suggest a person who is very
concerned about missing out on social contacts with friends. The authors
reported an alpha of .90 and correlations of -.29, -.19, and -.24 with
psychological need satisfaction, overall life satisfaction, and mood,
respectively. Further evidence for validity are the findings of a +.40
correlation between FoMOPrzy and social media engagement (Przybylski
et al., 2013) and highly significant correlations between an Arabic
language adaptation of FoMOPrzy and scores on a social media addiction
scale (Al-Menayes, 2016). Two additional studies also found significant
correlations between scores on FoMOPrzy and measures of social media
engagement (Alt, 2015; Michot, Blancot, & Munoz, 2016). Riordan,
Flett, Hunter, Scarf, and Conner (2015) found alphas of .85 and .86 in
two studies using FoMOPrzy, and highly significant correlation
coefficients between scores on that scale and a measure of negative
alcohol-related consequences. They attributed this result to the likelihood
that persons high on FoMO may drink more in order to be liked, and the
possibility that they may be exposed to more social events in which
alcohol is present. Cronbach’s alpha for the scale in the present study is
.87.
The Fear of Missing Out scale (FoMO Abel et al, 2016). Hereafter we
will call it FoMO Abel to avoid confusion with FoMO Przy. This 10-item
scale was developed by Abel et al., (2016). Scores on each item can range
from 1 (Never) to 8 (Always). High scores indicate a high fear of missing
out. Whereas the FoMO Przy scale relies on items that relate to situations
directly describing the fear of missing out, FoMO Abel takes the approach
of using items that measure psychological traits (i.e., irritability, anxiety,
and feelings of inadequacy) presumed to underlie FoMO. Factor analysis of
a large number of these types of items resulted in three factors. The first of
these is labeled self-esteem (5 items, alpha = .88; e.g.“I feel I do not have
much to be proud of”). The second they called social
interaction/extraversion, but strikes us as a measure of shyness (3 items,
alpha = .69; e.g. “Do you feel uncomfortable meeting new people?”). The
third is social anxiety (2 items, alpha = .85; e.g. “Assume you are unable to
check social media when you want to,” and “Generally, how frequently do
you feel nervous?”). Validity was established by finding that high FoMO
Abel scores were associated with the urge to check social media when with
others, the urge to check social media when unable to log on for any reason,
and the greater reported frequency of Facebook usage (Abel et al., 2016).
Cronbach’s alphas for the three subscales in the present study are .82, .78,
and .85, respectively.
 Browne, Aruguete, McCutcheon, Medina CORRELATES OF FoMO 347

Procedure
Investigators told participants their responses were confidential and
did not reveal the purpose of the study. In keeping with IRB policy at
each institution, students were informed that they could quit the study at
any time for any reason without any negative consequences. No students
quit the study. We counterbalanced the seven scales being administered
(CAS ES with demographic items, FoMO Przy and FoMO Abel ), with
each participant receiving one of several thousand possible orderings.
Participants completed all seven scales in approximately 30 minutes,
using paper-and-pencil measures. Participants completed questionnaires
in groups ranging in size from 2 to 40 at their respective universities over
a period of about eight weeks in the fall of 2016.

RESULTS
Table 1 shows descriptive statistics for all measures. We examined
scatterplots to assess linearity among the variables. All scatterplots
indicated varying degrees of linear relationships among the variables.
Pearson product moment correlations were performed to examine links
among measures, as presented in Table 2. All measures, with the
exception of the CAS ES scale, correlated significantly with FoMO Przy,

TABLE 1 Means, Standard Deviations (SD), Alphas, and Ranges for

Each Scale or Subscale
_____________________________________________________________
Measure Mean SD Alpha Range
(AAQ II) 21.93 8.77 .89 7 - 45
Celebrity AttitudeScale (CAS-ES) 31.48 7.40 .86 10 - 50
FoMO Abel Social Anxiety (SA) 4.47 2.81 .85 2 - 16
FoMO Abel Self Esteem (SE) 13.61 5.89 .82 5 - 40
FoMO Abel Social Interaction (SI) 11.90 5.29 .78 3 - 24
FoMO Abel Total 29.98 10.36 .80 10 - 65
FoMOPrzy 2.40 .79 .87 1 - 4.70
Need to Belong Scale (NBS) 31.76 7.33 .81 10 - 50
PANAS NA 21.47 6.16 .84 10 - 42
PANAS PA 36.27 6.12 .81 18 - 50
(RSQ) 8.96 3.13 .61 1.75–
19.50
Note: AAQ II = Acceptance & Action Questionnaire
RSQ = Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire
348 NORTH AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY

FoMO Abel Total and the three Abel subscales. We also detected
significant, moderately-sized relations between FoMO Abel and FoMO
PRZY, r (276) = .41, p < .001). Table 3 presents comparisons between
scale correlations for the two FOMO measures. Follow-up z-tests for
significant differences between correlation coefficients revealed
significantly larger correlation coefficients for FoMO Abel and the
PANAS-NA, PANAS-PA, and RSQ scales (z’s = -3.26, 3.54, and -2.42
respectively, p < .05). The difference between correlation coefficients for
the FoMO scales and the AAQ-II approached significance (p < .06).

TABLE 2 Correlations between the Variables Measured in the Study

1 2 3 4 5 6
1. AAQ II --
2. CAS ES .06 --
3. FoMOAbel SA .31** .10 --
4. FoMOAbel SE .48** .05 .27** --
5. FoMOAbel SI .35** .06 .26** .32** --
6. FoMOAbel Tot .54** .08 .56** .81** .76** --
7. FoMOPrzy .44** .02 .39** .30** .25** .41**
8. NBS .31** -.06 .31** .30** .17** .33**
9. PANAS NA -.57** .04 .26** .46** .28** .47**
10. PANAS PA -.23** .13* -.18** -.53** -.21** -.46**
11. RSQ .43** .01 .26** .33** .18** .35**

TABLE 2 (Continued)
7 8 9 10 11
7. FoMOPrzy --
8. NBS .64** --
9. PANAS NA .29** .24** --
10. PANAS PA -.25** -.22** -.21** --
11. RSQ .20** .22** .33** -.17* --
Acceptance & Action Questionnaire (AAQ II); Celebrity Attitude Scale (CAS-ES); FoMO
Abel Social Anxiety (SA);FoMO Abel Self Esteem (SE), FoMO Abel Social Interaction
(SI); FoMO Abel Total; FoMOPryzbylski scale; Need to Belong Scale (NBS); Rejection
Sensitivity Questionnaire (RSQ)
*p < .01, **p < .001

Prior to performing the regression analyses multicollinearity was

assessed by examining the correlations among the predictors (none over
.80) and we also examined the average value inflation factor (VIF) for
each analysis. These were close to 1, indicating a lack of multicollinearity
among the predictors. An examination of the Zpredicted vs Zresidual plot
and partial regression plots for each analysis indicated that the
assumptions of linearity and homoscedasticity of errors were met.
 Browne, Aruguete, McCutcheon, Medina CORRELATES OF FoMO 349

Histogram and P-P plots indicated that our residuals were normally
distributed as well. Casewise diagnostics were used to find any potential
outliers with standardized residuals greater than 3. For both analyses
there were no cases that met that criterion. We further examined poten-

TABLE 3 Correlations of FoMO Przy & FoMO Abel with All Other
Variables
CAS ES PANAS PANAS PA RSQ AAQ NBS
NA II
FoMOPrzy .02 .29 -.25 .20 .44 .64
FoMOAbel .08 .48 -.46 .35 .54 .33
Note: All correlation coefficients at .20 and higher are significant at .001.

tial outliers by creating and examining Cooks distances for each case. No
case exceeded the cutoff criteria, therefore no cases were removed. Next,
two forced entry multiple regressions were performed separately using
FoMO Przy and FoMO Abel as the criteria and the PANAS scales, RSQ,
AAQ-II, and NBS as predictors. CAS ES was excluded as it was not cor-

TABLE 4 Standardized Betas in Regression Models Predicting FoMO

Scales
___________________________________________________________
FoMO FoMO
Przy(β) ABEL(β)
PANAS_Neg .02 .19***
PANAS_Pos -.06 -.32***
Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (RSQ) -.05 .08
Acceptance & Action Questionnaire (AAQ .27*** .28***
Need to Belong Scale (NBS) .55*** .13**
R2 .48*** .47***
*p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

related with either scale. We used the forced entry regression method due
to the small number of predictors and having no a priori predictions for
the order of importance of the predictors. The regression model for
FoMOPrzy was statistically significant, F(5, 266) = 48.41, p < .001. This
model accounted for 48% of the variance in FoMOPrzy scores. The
regression for the FoMO Abel measure was also statistically significant,
F(5, 271) = 46.56, p < .001. This model accounted for 47% of the
variance in Abel scores. See Table 4 for the standardized Betas for each
predictor.
350 NORTH AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY

DISCUSSION
The pattern of unhypothesized relationships follows common sense
and is consistent with previous research. For example, PANAS PA
correlated negatively, r(281) = -.21, p <.01) with PANAS NA, and
PANAS PA correlated negatively, r(281) = -.17, p <.01) with RSQ and
negatively, r(283) = -.23, p <.001) with AAQ-II. These are relatively
small correlations, and may be significant largely due to sample size. We
expected measures of rejection sensitivity and psychological distress
would correlate positively, and they did (RSQ: r(279) = .43, p <.001,
with AAQ-II). PANAS NA should correlate positively with AAQ-II and
the RSQ because high scores on all three represent negative thoughts or
emotions. In fact, PANAS NA did correlate strongly with the AAQ-II.
This finding is consistent with the .67 correlation between these same two
variables reported by Bond et al. (2011). PANAS NA also correlated
significantly with RSQ, r(278) = .33, p <.001). An earlier study found no
relationship between rejection sensitivity and the need to belong (Leary et
al., 2013). However, a strong need to belong would seem to go hand in
hand with rejection sensitivity. In fact, we found that RSQ, a measure of
rejection sensitivity, did correlate significantly with the need to belong,
though again, somewhat weakly, r(283) = .22, p <.01, and possibly due to
sample size. Scores on CAS ES did not correlate significantly with any of
the scores on the five measures of emotion, nor did we expect them to,
because CAS ES is an entertainment and social dimension. In light of the
3-stage absorption-addiction model of celebrity worship, however, we did
expect that FoMO scores would be positively related to CAS ES scores.
Although this hypothesis was not supported by the data, taken
collectively the findings do indicate that our participants were
conscientious and took our research seriously.
Results largely supported our hypotheses related to FoMO and
psychosocial correlates. We predicted that high FoMO scorers would
tend to have a moderately high need to belong, high negative affect, and
somewhat high scores on measures of distress. Furthermore, we predicted
that high FoMO scorers would have low scores on a measure of positive
affect, and be sensitive to rejection. All of these hypotheses were
supported by the results. As noted earlier, the data failed to support our
prediction that persons high in FoMO would tend to be strongly attracted
to a favorite celebrity for social reasons (because the fear of missing out
is clearly related to social interaction).
The results of the two regression analyses indicated that the NBS (β =
.55) and AAQ II (β = .27) scales were the most important predictors for
the FoMO Przy scale while PANAS PA (β = -.32) and AAQ II (β = .28)
were the most important predictors for the FoMO Abel scale. Regression
analyses revealed that the predictors accounted for roughly the same
 Browne, Aruguete, McCutcheon, Medina CORRELATES OF FoMO 351

amount of variance in each FoMO scale; the model predicting the FoMO
Przy scale produced an R2 that was almost exactly the same (R2 =.48 and
R2 =.47, respectively) as the FoMO Abel scale.
Despite this similarity, an important distinction is notable.
Regression results suggest that whereas the FoMO Przy scale shares
considerable overlap with the need to belong, this is not true for the
FoMO Abel scale. In turn, results suggest that the two measures tap
related yet distinguishable underlying processes, with less variance in the
FoMO Abel scale accounted for by any one predictor (in comparison to
the variance accounted for by the Need to Belong scale in the FoMO
Przy). It is plausible that the FoMO Abel scale more specifically
captures the unique process that is the ‘fear of missing out.’ Scores on the
Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire did not significantly predict either
FoMO measure. This may be due to the low reliability we obtained for
the RSQ, or it may be that neither FOMO scale taps the social anxiety
encompassed by the RSQ.
Both FoMO measures demonstrated strong internal consistency and
scores for each scale were moderately correlated with most of the
theoretically related constructs we examined. As noted, the FoMO Abel
scale appears to tap the fear of missing out more specifically than the
FoMO Przy scale. FoMO Abel correlated significantly higher with RSQ,
and both PANAS scales than FoMO Przy did. In using FoMO Abel, we
recommend using total scores because total FoMO Abel scores correlated
higher with the predictor variables than any of its subscales with one
exception (-.53 to -.47, favoring Abel SE over Abel Total).
Abel et al. (2016) claim to have a FoMO scale based on personality
traits that underlie the fear of missing out. We noted that the largest
subscale (Abel SE, low self-esteem) correlated .81 with the total Abel
score, suggesting that this measure may tap little more than the construct
of low self-esteem. However, the other subscales (Abel SI and SA)
appear to assess a certain level of social inhibition and social anxiety as
well. The third factor (social anxiety), however, is as situational as the
items on FoMOPrzy. The two items that constitute the third factor ask
respondents how frequently they feel frightened or nervous when they
cannot check social media as often as they desire.
One limitation of this study is the complete reliance on self-report
measures. Another limitation is that one of the measures we used (RSQ)
yielded a reliability coefficient that was below the .70 level. Moreover,
the generalizability of our findings is limited to traditional age college
students, and replication is recommended with older adults from the
general population. As is the case with correlational studies in general,
this one does not show the direction of causation
352 NORTH AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY

The validation of new scales is not a one-time procedure. We

recommend that future research with FoMO Przy and FoMO Abel
examine additional variables that might reasonably be expected to
correlate with both, and determine how well our findings generalize to
groups of non-students of varying age and ethnicity.

REFERENCES
Abel, J. P., Buff, C. L., & Burr, S. A. (2016). Social media and the fear of
missing out: Scale development and assessment. Journal of Business and
Economic Research, 14(1), 33-44.
Al-Menayes, J. (2016). The Fear of Missing Out Scale: Validation of the Arabic
version and correlation with social media addiction. International Journal of
Applied Psychology, 6(2), 41-46.
Alt, D. (2015). College students’ academic motivation, media engagement, and
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