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FOMO, Digital Dementia, and OurDangerous Experiment

|| Larry Dossey, MD ||

Silence is God0s first language;everything else is a poor translation.

—Thomas Keating1

We have all seen them: the chic couplein a restaurant passionately thumbingtheir smartphones while ignoring oneanother, each cocooned in his or herprivate world. Then there is the etiquettebuster at the movies in the seat in frontof us, who ignores the prohibition oftexting while his smartphone0s retina-scorching screen blinds us. And there isthe annoying person in line at Starbuckswho cannot stop messaging long enoughto keep the line moving. All theseindividuals have something in common:They may be suffering from FOMO.FOMO or FoMO is an acronym for

“fear of missing out.” It appeared in theUrban Dictionary as word of the day onApril 14, 2011.2 FOMO is considered aform of social anxiety—a compulsiveconcern that one might miss anopportunity for social interaction, a novelexperience, or some other satisfying event,often aroused by posts seen on socialmedia sites.3,4 FOMO reflects a worry thatfriends may be having rewarding experi-ences from which one is absent.

FOMO FACTSResearch psychologist, Andrew Przy-bylski of the University of Essex, andcolleagues3 at University of California-Los Angeles and University of Rochesterhave recently published the first empiri-cally based investigation of FOMO.Their findings:

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FOMO is a driving force behind socialmedia use.

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FOMO levels are highest in youngpeople and young men in particular.

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Low levels of need satisfaction and lifesatisfaction are linked to high FOMO.

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FOMO is high in those who engage indistracted driving.

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FOMO is high in students who usesocial media during classes.

Evidence suggests that a vicious cycleoperates in individuals with high levelsof FOMO: they end up feeling increas-ingly lonely because they substitutesocial media contact for real face timewith others, which increases their senseof isolation, which adds to FOMO, andso on. This suggests that “social network”is an oxymoron, because for many it isnot social at all. As former FOMOvictim, Glennon Melton,5 who blogsfor Momastery.com, puts it, “I thinktoo much life spent on social mediacan make us perpetually somewhereelse and alone.” Maureen Dowd, thefiery New York Times columnist, agrees.She believes personal electronic devicessabotage intimacy, saying, “Theextension of information obsession tothe field of intimacy—which is the slowrevelation of one person to another—ruins the mystery, poetry and suspense.Instead of caressing, there0s posting;instead of kissing, there0s forwarding,sharing and sending.”6

Social media expert and MIT pro-fessor Sherry Turkle explains in herbook Alone Together how the isolationworks. “Some who say ‘I live my life onmy Blackberry’ are forthright aboutavoiding the ‘real-time’ commitmentof a phone call. The new technologiesallow us to ‘dial down’ human contact,to titrate its nature and content…Texting offers just the right amountof access, just the right amount ofcontrol.” Speaking of a 13-year-oldwho “hates the phone and never listensto voice-mail,” Turkle observes, “She isa modern Goldilocks: for her, textingputs people not too close, not too far,but at just the right distance. The

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world is now full of modern Gold-ilockses, people who take comfort inbeing in touch with a lot of peoplewhom they also keep at bay.” Turkle7

sums up the dilemma many face in awired world: “When is downtime,when is stillness? The text-drivenworld of rapid response does not makeself-reflection impossible, but does lit-tle to cultivate it.”Psychologist John Grohol, an expert

in online mental health and founder ofPsych Central, further elaborates theFOMO dynamic. “Teens and adults textwhile driving, because the possibility ofa social connection is more importantthan their own lives (and the lives ofothers). They interrupt one call to takeanother, even when they don0t knowwho0s on the other line… They checktheir Twitter stream while on a date,because something more interesting orentertaining just might be happening.It0s not ‘interruption,’ it0s connection.But wait a minute… it0s not really‘connection’ either. It0s the potential forsimply a different connection. It may bebetter, it may be worse—we don0t knowuntil we check. We are so connectedwith one another through our Twitterstreams and Foursquare check-ins,through our Facebook and LinkedInupdates, that we can0t just be aloneanymore. The fear of missing out(FOMO)—on something more fun, ona social date that might just happen onthe spur of the moment—is so intense,even when we0ve decided to disconnect,we still connect just once more, just tomake sure.”8

Social media that provide the con-stant opportunity to be “liked,” to havefriends and followers, and which pro-vide the continual possibility for a com-parison of one0s status, such asFacebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, areespecially likely to promote FOMO.9–11

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ARE YOU ADDICTED TO THE WEB?Here is an exercise in self-diagnosis—thequestions used by a Chinese teamresearching the effect of heavy Internetuse on kids0 brains.12

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Do you feel absorbed in the Internet(you remember previous online activ-ity or long for the next session)?

2)

Do you feel satisfied with Internetuse if you increase your amount oftime online?

3)

Have you failed to control, reduce orgive up Internet use repeatedly?

4)

Do you feel nervous, temperamental,depressed or sensitive when trying toreduce or give up Internet use?

5)

Do you stay online longer than ori-ginally intended?

6)

Have you taken the risk of losing asignificant relationship, job, educa-tional or career opportunity becauseof the Internet?

7)

Have you lied to your family mem-bers, therapist or others to hide thetruth of your involvement with theInternet?

8)

Do you use the Internet as a way ofescaping from problems or relievingan anxious mood, e.g. feelings ofhelplessness, guilt, anxiety ordepression?

The researchers say, “You are an Inter-net addict if you answered ‘yes’ toquestions one to five and to at leastone of the remaining questions.”

FIGHTING FOMO

I0ve found that remarking on everyremarkable thing just makes every-thing less remarkable… I have “BeStill” tattooed on my wrist because Iknow that feelings, creativity,inspiration, wisdom, peace and therest of the good stuff knock duringempty moments.

—Glennon Melton, blogger atMomastery.com5

Martha Beck, the American sociolo-gist and bestselling author, holds abachelor0s degree in East Asian Studiesand a PhD degree in sociology fromHarvard University. One of her concernsis the pernicious influence of socialmedia in kids0 lives. Beck says, “Thesocial media world that named FOMOhas also made it an epidemic. It0s hard

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not to develop this 21st century form ofanxiety when one glance at your smart-phone reveals a thousand awesomethings your friends—and enemies—aredoing.” As a former FOMO sufferer anda parent, Beck is concerned with prac-tical methods by which kids can resistthe fear of missing out.13 Her startingpoint is to expose the inherent sillinessof the situation:

OMG, do you have any idea whatyou0re missing right now? Have youchecked Facebook in the last twominutes? If so, you know thateveryone (and by that I mean every-one but you) is out there totallyrocking life. Your BFF (that is, yourformer BFF) and her new BFF aretrekking through Ladakh. Your col-lege roommate has built an Internetempire. Your cousin0s at a wackycostume party, LOL—no, ROFL!Right now, everybody out there(except you) is whirling ravishinglythrough the good life! Together! Inflash mobs! What R U doing?

How to resist? Beck0s Strategy 1:Realize that FOMO is based on lies. Peoplewho post their activities on social mediasites skim their life and select the incan-descent moments. This is profoundlymisleading. As Beck says, “A powerfulway to fight FOMO is to recognize thatthe fabulous life you think you0re miss-ing doesn0t in fact exist. The whole truthis that most of us spend enormousportions of our time looking for ourcar keys while suspecting there0s some-thing biochemically wrong with us. Thewhole truth is that today, plenty of uswill spend hours trying unsuccessfully tomuster the energy to bathe—hours thatwill be memorialized in neither picturesnor words. The whole truth is that if youcould trade places with the people whogive you the most raging cases ofFOMO, you0d probably find out they0rereally, really tired.”Beck0s Strategy 2: Fight FOMO with

FOMO. Immunize yourself fromFOMO by changing the definition. LetFOMO mean, say, “Feel Okay MoreOften” or “Find One MagnificentObject” by contemplating something athand that is wonderful but simple: “thesun, a bowl of soup, your own hand.”Beck0s Strategy 3: Stop. Be present.

Be still. Be silent. Acknowledge thewonder that is implicit in this very

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moment, and that the important thingis what is happening here, now, not insome hyped, imagined, facebooked,tweeted cyber-fantasy.

DEATH BY INTERNET IN SOUTHKOREAFor the past five years, Internet addic-tion has been considered a public healthcrisis in South Korea, the world0s mostwired nation. The problem became anational issue after users started drop-ping dead from exhaustion after playingonline games for days on end.Almost 100% of South Korean house-

holds have access to broadband infra-structure. The government estimates thatup to 30% of those under 18 years of ageare at risk. To combat the problem, over200 counseling centers and hospitalsnow offer treatment by more than1000 trained Internet addiction counse-lors, at no cost to the affectedindividual.14

Severely affected kids can be sent toInternet detox boot camp. An exampleis the Jump Up Internet Rescue Schoolnear Seoul, the first of its kind in Koreaand perhaps the world. Part boot camp,part rehab center, the school resemblesprograms around the world for troubledyouth. “Drill instructors drive youngmen through military-style obstaclecourses, counselors lead group sessions,and there are even therapeutic work-shops on pottery and drumming,” saidThe New York Times in an in-depthreport.15

Concerns continue to increase inSouth Korea. Researchers are now con-cerned with “digital dementia,” a termcoined in that country to describe adeterioration in cognitive abilities fre-quently seen in people who have suf-fered head trauma or brain diseases.South Korean physicians studying thisphenomenon say that heavy Internet usemay overdevelop the left side of thebrain and leave the right side under-developed. Attention and memory spanare affected, along with impulse control.Many heavy Internet users, whichincludes 18% of those between 10 and19 years of age who use their smart-phones for more than seven hours a day,cannot perform simple memory taskssuch as recalling their own phonenumbers.16

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While “digital dementia” may be toostrong a term for some forms of cogni-tive dysfunction associated with heavyInternet use, the aberrations are realnonetheless. Blogger Glennon Melton,mentioned above, spent 40 days withoutlogging on to anything after realizing shehad become seriously Internet-addicted.Only then did she recognize how herobsessive Internet habit had changed herover the years. “When I was detoxingfrom social media,” she wrote, “I realizedthat I was thinking in status updates. Itseemed I had trained my brain to trans-late everything I experienced throughoutthe day into 140 characters or less.Everything complex became simple,everything beautiful became ordinary,everything three-dimensional quicklybecame just two. A week passed beforeI stopped automatically translating everyindescribable moment, sunset or con-versation with my kids into two sen-tences. I had to learn to stop shoving lifeinto tweets and just let things be wildand big again.”5

BRAIN DAMAGE DOCUMENTEDAn alarm went off in China in 2008.That year an extensive survey reported inChina Daily found that 9.7% of ChineseInternet users between 13 and 30 yearsof age suffer Internet addiction.17 AnInternet addict was defined as someonewhose life, career, and interpersonalrelations are harmed by Internet use.The Chinese emphasized three criteria:“First, a person feels happier or moreself-fulfilled online than in the realworld. Second, he feels upset, depressed,or panicked when being cut off from theInternet for any reason. Third, he lies tothe family members about how long hespends online.” Among the addicted,68% were males.18

Especially worrisome is a rigorous,controlled study utilizing state-of-the-art brain scanning technology to studythe brains of 18 Internet-addicted uni-versity students in China who spent 8–13 h a day playing games online. Theywere compared with 18 Chinese univer-sity students who spent less than twohours a day on the Internet.19 Scientistsfound signs of atrophy of gray matter inthe brains of all the heavy Internet users.The longer their Internet addictioncontinued, the more serious the

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damage. The researchers also foundchanges in the white matter lyingbelow the gray-matter cortex.Western researchers have praised the

quality of this study, but are disturbedby its ominous findings. PsychologistAric Sigman, a fellow of London0s RoyalSociety of Medicine, called the study a“wake-up call.” He said, “It strikes me as aterrible shame that our society requiresphotos of brains shrinking in order totake seriously the common-senseassumption that long hours in front ofscreens is not good for our children0shealth.”20

Some laypersons responded to thestudy by coming to the defense of theInternet. One American teacher said,“It0s not ‘internet’ per se, it0s spendingthe hours playing ‘games online’ thatdeadens parts of the brain. Readinginteresting/provocative articles or watch-ing a thought-provoking video segmentcan only stimulate the brain0s faculties…This is just throwing the internet underthe bus.”21 The teacher offered noempirical evidence to back up hisopinion. Some researchers heartilydisagree, saying that its overall screentime and the attendant social isolation,not Internet content, which mattermost.22

AWAKE AND ONLINEWhat is the relevance of shrinking brainsin China to the situation in the U.S.?“If your kids are awake, they0re prob-

ably online,” said a report on media useby kids in The New York Times in January2010.23 “The average young Americannow spends practically every wakingminute—except for the time in school—using a smart phone, computer,television or other electronic device.”The basis for these observations is a2009 national survey by the KaiserFamily Foundation, “Generation M2:Media in the Lives of 8- to 18-Year-Olds.”24 The study found that kidsbetween 8 and 18 years of age spendmore than seven-and-a-half hours a daywith such devices. And that does notcount the hour and a half they spendtexting, the surveyors said, or the half-hour they talk on their cell phones.Furthermore, as a result of media multi-tasking, such as surfing the Internetwhile listening to music, they cram

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nearly 11 h of media content into thoseseven-and-half hours.The authors of the Kaiser study say

they were shocked. Following a similarsurvey in 2005, they concluded that theuse of electronic devices could notpossibly grow further. Their 2009 studyfound several worrisome trends, such asthe correlation of heavy media use withbehavioral problems and lower grades.What are parents to do? Some experts

suggest they simply get over it. Pediatri-cian Michael Rich,25 director of theCenter on Media and Child Health ofChildren0s Hospital Boston, says thatmedia use among kids is so pervasivethat it is time to stop arguing overwhether it is good or bad and accept itas part of children0s environment, “likethe air they breathe, the water they drinkand the food they eat.” This conclusionhorrifies experts such as the RoyalSociety0s Aric Sigman, quoted above.Who can stand idly by when we nowknow that heavy Internet use inadolescence is correlated with shrinkingbrains?

FRIENDS DON0T LET FRIENDS TEXTAND DRIVEIt is not just brains that are at risk fromFOMO. Entire bodies are.Texting while driving is now the lead-

ing cause of death for teen drivers. Dr.Andrew Adesman, associate professor ofclinical pediatrics at the Albert EinsteinCollege of Medicine, and a team ofinvestigators estimate that, nationwide,more than 3000 teens die annually and300,000 sustain injuries from textingwhile driving. This exceeds the estimated2700 young people who die each year asa result of driving under the influence ofalcohol, and the 282,000 who are treatedin emergency rooms for injuries sufferedin alcohol-related motor-vehicle crashes,according to the Centers for DiseaseControl and Prevention. In the Ades-man study, 49% of teen boys admittedto texting while driving, compared to45% of girls. “We have very strongtaboos against drinking and driving,”Adesman said. “Kids don0t drink anddrive every day. But some kids are outthere texting and driving seven days aweek—and they admit it.”26

Cell phone use while driving is apublic menace and is epidemic.

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According to Carinsurance.org, 56% ofteens talk on the phone while driving.Talking on a cell phone slows youngdrivers0 reaction time to that of a 70-yearold and doubles the likelihood of anaccident. Texting while driving is muchworse. It makes a crash 23 times morelikely and caused 1.3 million crashes in2011 alone.27

The connection with FOMO is clear.As we have seen, psychologist AndrewPrzybylski and his colleagues havedemonstrated that “FOMO is high inthose who engage in distracted driving.”What about role models? The pro-

blem is that it isn0t just teens who aretexting; a large proportion of moms,dads, and grandparents do the same. Ina recent California survey of 715 adultsbetween the ages of 30 and 64 years,nearly two-thirds admitted to using acell phone while driving with children inthe car, and one-third acknowledgedtexting while driving. And in a nation-wide survey of 1700 teens conducted byan insurance company, 91% report thattheir parents talk on cell phones whiledriving, 88% say mom and dad speed,and 59% of teens have seen their parentstext while driving.28

Add it all up and what do you get?According to the National HighwayTraffic Safety Administration, at anygiven daytime moment, more than100,000 drivers are texting, while morethan 600,000 drivers are using handheldphones while operating a car.29

Is “take the train” a good way to escapethe plague of auto drivers who aretalking or texting? It did not work inSpain on July 24, 2013, when 79 peoplewere killed and scores injured when thedriver derailed his train on a tight curve,traveling 119 miles an hour, while talk-ing on his cell phone. Or in 2008, whena Metrolink commuter train ran head-oninto a freight train in the Chatsworthdistrict of Los Angeles, killing 25 people,while the engineer was distracted whiletexting a message to a teenage train buff.

DISTRACTED WALKINGBonnie Miller, an Indiana mother,nearly drowned in March 2012 whenshe fell from a pier into Lake Michiganwhile texting, but was rescued by herhusband. In August 2012, a Philadelphiaman fell from a pedestrian platform

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onto train tracks after being distractedby a text, but a Good Samaritan helpedhim get out of harm0s way. In February2011, Ryan Robbins, 19, after a nightout in Melbourne, Australia, acciden-tally walked over a short railing in aparking lot while texting a friend andplunged to his death.30

While everyone has heard of dis-tracted driving, the dangers of dis-tracted walking are only nowbeginning to draw attention. A recentOhio State University study estimatesthere were about two million pedestrianinjuries related to mobile phone use in2010, and that this figure is likely todouble by 2015 if current trends con-tinue. The researchers found that mostpedestrian injuries occurred while talk-ing rather than texting.31 (This givesnew meaning to “walkie talkie.”)Individuals most likely to be injuredby distracted walking are 21–25 yearsold, an age group that is also at highrisk for FOMO.It is not just sprained ankles. It is also

broken bones, dislocated shoulders, andconcussions. It is undoubtedly deaths aswell, but because dead people do notreport what they were doing at themoment of injury, reliable statisticsabout pedestrian fatalities due to theuse of portable electronic devices arehard to come by.One wag has suggested that iPhone

stands for idiotPhone, since the walkersusing them often appear to be in a kindof techno-stupor.

OUR DANGEROUS EXPERIMENTBack to the brain. What do we knowabout heavy Internet use that is reason-ably certain?We know that FOMO is a driving

force behind high levels of Internet use.We know that eight hours or more ofdaily Internet involvement with videogames is correlated with brain shrinkageand damage in adolescents. We knowthat American children in general arealready at this threshold of use, aver-aging between seven and eight hours ofscreen time daily. We do not know all weneed to know about the relative impactof different Internet content on thebrain. Is heavy exposure to online edu-cational material as damaging to youngbrains as playing video games? Or does

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overall screen time trump content, what-ever the content may be?Because we are not certain of the

answers, this means that our childrenare unwitting subjects in a colossal,frightening human experiment whoseoutcome is potentially disastrous. Thepossible injury is not limited to a shrink-ing cerebral cortex. There are cancerconcerns as well, in adults as well aschildren. As Devra Davis, professor ofepidemiology and the director of theCentre for Environmental Oncology atthe University of Pittsburgh CancerInstitute, describes the risk of personalelectronic devices, “Because the latencybetween exposure and brain cancercould be 20 or 30 years… we arebasically treating ourselves like lab ratsin an experiment without anycontrols.”32

What should parents do? Doing noth-ing is not a good option. As editor-in-chief, Richard Horton, of The Lancet hassaid, “We must act on facts and on themost accurate interpretation of them,using the best scientific information.That does not mean that we must sitback until we have 100 percent evidenceabout everything. When the… health ofthe individual is at stake… we should beprepared to take action to diminishthose risks even when the scientificknowledge is not conclusive…”33

“Parent” comes from Latin words thatmean “to bring forth.” The etymologyimplies a strategy, a plan of action. Inorder to bring forth children in theirfullness, parents need to value the still-ness that can come from wisely limitingthe use of mind-numbing, attention-stealing, brain-shrinking electronic gad-gets. This is Martha Beck0s Strategy 3,Stop. It is cyber-insider, GlennonMelton0s “Be Still” wrist tattoo. It istranscendentalist Ralph WaldoEmerson0s “wise silence.” It was mymother0s “Go outside and play.”Adolescent brains come one per kid,

with no replacement parts. Their brainsare malleable, fragile, vulnerable, breath-takingly promising, and indescribablyprecious, but they are not wise.That is why parents must be.

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