Fomo Phenomenon: How and to What Extent Does it Affect Dental Students?

FOMO is a social phenomenon related to the constant anxiety or even fear of experiencing social isolation. It usually has various negative consequences that affect people’s lives. The main purpose of this research is to investigate the extent of FOMO’s consequences on students of the School of Dentistry of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, as well as their level of satisfaction with their lives. The research was carried out with self-referential questionnaires, with two well-known psychological scales, SWLS and FoMOs. Throughout the statistical analysis of the sample’s answers, it was found out that most participants are women at the age group of 18-24 with no job and monthly income of less than 300 euro. Also, TikTok and Facebook seem to be mostly preferred for long-distance social communication. However, most participants prefer face-to-face social contact. The replies to the questions of the two psychological scales showed that the mean value of FOMO level is equal to 24,095 and the mean value of SWLS scale is 21,6. So, based on the scales’ classifications, the students of the examined university population seem to experience moderate FOMO level and slight satisfaction with their lives. At the same time, it was noticed that the lower the FOMO level, the higher the satisfaction with life. But, there is a need for further surveys examining FOMO phenomenon in Greece in order to fully understand the level of satisfaction with life of people who are more connected with social media.

Since the beginning of 21st century, social life has undergone significant changes. Despite the positive impact of modern lifestyle, a recently known social phenomenon has made its appearance, as a result of people’s need for information, entertainment and socializing. This phenomenon is described by the acronym FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) and is triggered by people’s natural desire to be in constant connection with others’ lives [1]. In 1996, Dan Herman described this social phenomenon, without naming it as FOMO [2,3]. This specific acronym was primarily used in 2004 by Patrick McGinnis [4]. FOMO could be considered as a social “syndrome” with permanent anxiety or even fear, due to limited or even absent social communication, leading to social isolation [1-5]. It provokes a natural feeling of emptiness and possibly jealousy, which result in a spontaneous comparison among people’s lives [6]. So, the components of FOMO are cognitive, behavioral and addiction-related [7]. The aim of the present study is to investigate the severity of FOMO’s consequences at students of the School of Dentistry of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, and their satisfaction with life.

In order to determine the source of the sample, the researchers conducted two lotteries in a row. The first one was related to the sector of studies among all university institutions of Thessaloniki, Greece, whereas the second one was related to the school of studies of the previously chosen sector. The results from both drawings were accordingly: Sector of Health Sciences and School of Dentistry of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

During this study’s planning, the researchers determined specific research questions to be answered after data gathering and processing:

1. How much time do students of the School of Dentistry of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, spend on the internet?

2. What is the FOMO level of the chosen research sample?

3. What is the participants’ level of satisfaction with life?

4. Is there any correlation between demographic factors and FOMO severity, and if so, how do they affect FOMO level?

The research hypothesis to be confirmed or rejected suggests that the sample experiences at least moderate level of FOMO and is not by any means highly satisfied with life. The results and conclusions of this survey are based on quantitative and qualitative data gathered with self-referential close-ended multiple choice questionnaires. Some questions provided participants with the chance to choose more than one answer. The questionnaires consisted of five parts: the introductory part with the aim of the study and participant’s consent, section A with questions related to internet and the use of social media, section B with questions of scale FoMOs (Fear of Missing Out scale), section C with questions of scale SWLS (Satisfaction With Life Scale) and finally, section D with demographic questions. The scales FoMOs and SWLS are two widespread and scientifically approved psychological scales used to measure the impact of FOMO phenomenon on people’s lives. Especially, FoMOs scale, developed by Dr. Przybylski, is considered to be the most usually applied self-referential psychological tool to determine a person’s FOMO level [8-10]. In FoMOs questionnaire, there are 10 questions, each one of which receives a value ranging from 1 to 5. So, the total minimum possible score is 10 and the maximum is 50 (Table 1). On the other hand, scale SWLS consists of 5 questions, each one of which receives a value ranging from 1 to 7. So, the total minimum possible score is 5 and the maximum is 35 (Table 2). Through our research, we calculated the mean value of both scales, taking into consideration the cumulative scores of each participant. The questionnaires were distributed and collected between 1st May 2022 and 31st May 2022. In total, 200 questionnaires were handed out to students of the School of Dentistry of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, regardless of the academic year they attend. However, 180 questionnaires were finally collected, whereas 169 out of these 180 were answered correctly. So, keeping in mind that during the academic year 2021 – 2022 the School of Dentistry had 870 enrolled students, the sample of our research may be considered representative of the population under examination (19,4%).The inclusion criteria for the participants of the study have been determined by the researchers as follows: a) They should be 18 years old or older, b) They should consent to take part in the survey, and c) They should be able to communicate in Greek in order to understand the questions and avoid misunderstandings and non-realistic answers. Neither the attendance year of each participant nor any social and cultural factors were set as exclusion criteria. 

The statistical analysis of the numeric and qualitative data of the questionnaires was conducted with the statistical program IBM SPSS Statistics 23, and afterwards graphs and charts were created in order to better illustrate the results. Even though the demographic questions were asked at the end of the questionnaires (section D), it is preferable to present them first for the better description of the research’s sample. The researchers observed a greater representation of the feminine gender (Figure 1). Only 17,2% of the participants are students older than 24 years old (Figure 2). Also, the majority (3 out of 4 participants) seems to have very limited monthly income (lower than 300 euro) (Figure 3). This finding is in agreement with the occupational status of the students, most of which (almost 9 out of 10 participants) either work at part-time jobs or are unoccupied (Figure 4). It is worth noticing that women are more likely to have very low monthly income (95 out of 127 of all participants whose monthly income is lower than 300 euro) (Figure 5). Throughout the processing of the answers of section A, it was noticed that 77,5% of the participants spends up to 6 hours daily on the internet, which replies to the 1st research question (Table 3). As far as the use of smartphones is concerned, 87,6% of the sample uses them mainly to surf the web and the social media, regardless of the participants’ gender (Figure 6). When asked about the purpose of internet surfing with a multiple-choice question allowing more than one answers to be chosen, almost all participants (97%) picked the answer related to social communication with friends (Figure 7). Nevertheless, 7 out of 10 of them tend to prefer face-to-face communication rather than long-distance communication through social media (Figure 8). In an effort to correlate the time spent on internet surfing and the preferred method of communication, it seems that those surfing the web for 4 to 6 hours daily are most likely to dedicate more time to communicate face-to-face rather than through social media (Table 4). Regarding the most usually visited social media, TikTok seems to be the most popular with no gender dependence (Figure 9). When examining participants’ age, participants from the age group 18-24, which is the greatest group of the survey, prefer Facebook than TikTok (Figure 10). Taking into account the answers given to the FoMOs scale of section B of the questionnaires, the mean total score is 24,095 and so, based on the classification of Table 1, this total score is within the range 21 – 35 (Table 5). 

Figure 1: Participants’ gender.

Figure 2: Participants’ age.

Figure 3: Participants’ monthly income.

Figure 4: Participants’ job status.

Figure 5: Correlation between gender and monthly income.

Figure 6: Most usually used electronic device for visiting the social media.

Figure 7: Purpose of using the internet.

Figure 8: Preference of communication type.

Figure 9: Mostly preferred social media.

Figure 10: Mostly preferred social media by participants of age group 18-24.

Table 1: Questionnaire of psychological scale FoMOs.

Table 2: Questionnaire of psychological scale SWLS.

Table 3: Hours dedicated to internet surfing daily (only one choice accepted).