Fear of Missing Out and Personality as Predictors of Social Networking Sites Usage: The Instagram Case
Year: 2020
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: With the exponential increase in the number of social networking sites (SNS) users, there is also a significant shift in the popularity of these SNS. Moreover, fear of missing out (FOMO) is often blamed for the growth in SNS addictive tendencies. The current research examines the influence of FOMO and Big 5 personality traits on SNS attitudes, usage, and addictive tendencies in the context of an increasingly popular SNS - Instagram. Participants completed online questionnaires that assessed their personality traits and then be-friended one of the researchers on Instagram, which provided the actual Instagram activity data (e.g., total number of Instagram posts, total number of likes, etc.). Hierarchical regression results showed that personality factors explained significant amounts of variance in terms of attitude towards Instagram, number of likes, total number of Instagram posts since account inception, and social media addictive tendencies. Furthermore, FOMO had a significant positive effect on attitude toward Instagram, the total number of Instagram accounts that respondents followed, and social media addictive tendencies.
Source: Psychological Reports
Authors: Kelly Moore, Georgiana Craciun
Institution: Duquesne University
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $3,000
Funder: Duquesne University
OpenAlex ID: W3041363362