Step 1: Description

In the description phase, you will need to not only draw on your own experiences with social media but also research others’ experiences systematically. For example, you might do qualitative research in the form of interviews with five or ten people to learn more about how social media makes them feel.

One tool to analyze social media use and the Fear of Missing Out was developed by a team of researchers in the United Kingdom and the United States.5 They created a ten-item questionnaire to measure levels of FOMO. Respondents answer each question on a five-point scale. A reproduction of that scale and questionnaire follows.

Respondents answer each question on a five-point scale, as follows: (1) not at all true of me; (2) slightly true of me; (3) moderately true of me; (4) very true of me; or (5) extremely true of me.

  1. I fear others have more rewarding experiences than me.
  2. I fear my friends have more rewarding experiences than me.
  3. I get worried when I find out my friends are having fun without me.
  4. I get anxious when I don’t know what my friends are up to.
  5. It is important that I understand my friends’ “in jokes.”
  6. Sometimes, I wonder if I spend too much time keeping up with what is going on.
  7. It bothers me when I miss an opportunity to meet up with friends.
  8. When I have a good time, it is important for me to share the details online (e.g., updating status).
  9. When I miss out on a planned get-together, it bothers me.
  10. When I go on vacation, I continue to keep tabs on what my friends are doing.

Other information to gather for your subjects could include the number of social media platforms they use (Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Google+, Instagram, Vine, and so on) and how frequently they use them. It would also be interesting to know if the subjects ever took a break from social media, and if so, why and for how long. For example, one sixteen-year-old female high school student reported, “I have disabled my Facebook a couple of times and it’s been nice, but I felt like I missed out on too much, so I went back to it.” To completely give up Facebook would be harder, she said. “I would just have to learn how to not know what people are doing all the time, and more importantly, not to care.”