Do you enjoy being alone? May hide social anxiety

In a recent study by Washington State University (USA), the majority of people with a high degree of “The joy of missing out on something” or JOMO (for its English acronym, “the joy of being lost”) also had high levels of social anxiety.

The term JOMO has become popular as a Enjoy healthy solitude In almost direct contrast to negative FOMO, people can have a “fear of missing out” when they see others enjoying pleasurable experiences without them, as explained above. In an analysis of two samples of adults, researchers found conflicting results when it came to JOMO, with evidence of some anxiety behind the joy.

Professor Chris Barry, lead author of the paper published in Communication and informatics reports. “In trying to evaluate Jomo, we found that some people They enjoyed getting lostNot because of isolation or because of the zen and calm experience of being able to regroup, but instead to avoid social interaction,” he cautioned.

This could also explain the relationship that exists between JOMO and social media use, a finding that surprised the researchers, who expected that people who wanted to miss out on social events Don’t worry about checking what their friends and family are up to. According to Barry, one possible explanation is that for those with social anxiety, social media can seem like a less intense way to engage than in-person interaction.

Barry and colleagues conducted the surveys with two different groups of approx 500 participants eachThey were recruited through Amazon’s “MTurk” crowdsourcing platform. To measure JOMO, the researchers asked a series of questions about their enjoyment of alone time and separation, such as whether participants liked taking time for self-reflection and whether they were happy to see their friends having a good time even though they weren’t. t with them. The survey also included questions designed to assess loneliness, social anxiety, social media use, personality traits and life satisfaction.

The first sample study revealed connections between those who had High level of JOMO with social media use and life satisfaction, but social anxiety had the strongest association.

With these mixed results, the team designed a second study to see if they could find a group of people who had high levels of JOMO but no social anxiety. They found it, but that group was small, I represented it 10 percent of the participants. Although no social anxiety was present, this Jomo elevated group had moderate feelings of loneliness.

Relationship with low self-esteem?

Although other research has linked the fear of losing confidence with low self-esteem and loneliness, these findings suggest that experiencing the joy of being lost is not entirely clear-cut. Barry suggested that JOMO may not be a steady state Or associated with personality traits, rather, it is a temporary stage of the need for separation.

There are a lot of unanswered questions, like, “What is a good dose of social interaction versus detachment?” “I think that will vary from person to person,” Barry said.

Previous research has shown that, for people with anxiety, constant exposure to what makes them anxious can happen help reduce stress, Therefore, for social anxiety sufferers, more interaction is better, not less. “Motivations matter,” says Barry. Why do people lose things? If it’s because they need to recharge their batteries, that’s probably a good thing. If they try to avoid something, it may not be healthy in the long run.”