Published in Journal of Consumer Affairs

ABSTRACT

Mindless use of social media leads to negative mental health outcomes for consumers. In this research, the authors focus on the fear of missing out (FOMO) as a key determinant of those negative outcomes by illustrating how repeated social media use forms a habit loop termed “social media FOMO.” The authors introduce a “Social Media FOMO to JOMO” framework, where they describe how mindless use can lead to social media FOMO and propose a novel Social Media Mindfulness Practice (SMMP) as a remedy to help consumers reduce FOMO and adopt a path called the joy of missing out (JOMO) that provides greater well-being. Based on the “Social Media FOMO to JOMO” framework and the SMMP, the authors suggest future research and highlight implications for consumers, marketers, and policy makers to promote more mindful social media use.

This paper stems from Track 1.9 of the 2021 Transformative Consumer Research (TCR) Conference

This work builds on our Journal of Public Policy & Marketing Thomas C. Kinnear award-winning research Mindfulness: Its Transformative Potential for Consumer, Societal, and Environmental Well-Being (Bahl et al. 2016) by applying concepts of mindful consumption to the public health crisis in social media use.

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