Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) and Sleep Quality: Evidence from Generation Z

Abstract

The widespread use of social media on smartphones has led to the various psychological issues, one of them are Fear of missing out (FOMO) and poor sleep among generation Z. The research problem of this study was to verify the hypothesis that the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is associated with the quality of sleep among Generation Z youths in three urban cities, namely Mardan, Peshawar, and Abbottabad in Pakistan. There were 300 participants (150 males and 150 females). Online Google Forms were used to gather data in Peshawar and Abbottabad, paper and pencil surveys were used in Mardan. FOMO and sleep quality respectively were measure with the aid of FOMO Scale, (FOMO; α = .70) and Sleep Quality Scale (SQS; α =.69). The one-way ANOVA indicated that no significant differences were found between the participants in terms of FOMO (F (2, 297) = 0.46, p = 0.63, η²= 0.003) or sleep quality (F (2, 297) = 1.81, p = 0.17, η²= 0.012) between the participants of Mardan, Peshawar, and Abbottabad. Furthermore, the independent samples t test did not report any statistically significant gender difference in FOMO (t (298) = 1.19, p = 0.23, Cohen’s d = 0.14). The results however declare that males reported a higher sleep quality as opposed to females (t (298) = 2.70, p = 0.01, Cohen’s d = 0.32). Correlation analysis revealed that there is a positive  relationship between FOMO and poorer quality of sleep. The results foreground the need to foster healthy digital habits and enhance sleep awareness among the Generation Z. One of the limitations of the study is that the sample is purposive, the research was based on self-report scales, and the differences between the cities that used different data collection methods, which can potentially limit the generalization of the results. To gain more insight on these relations, future studies need to utilize longitudinal designs and objective measures of sleep.