Investigating associations between personality and problematic social media use by considering trait and state FoMO as mediators

High Neuroticism and low Conscientiousness robustly correlate with both Problematic Social Media Use (PSMU) and Fear of Missing Out (FoMO). However studies investigating these concepts simultaneously are relatively rare, and few have examined the associations between the personality traits and PSMU by investigating both trait and state FoMO as potential mediators. In a sample of 576 German-speaking participants (of whom n = 94 were aged 13–17), we observed that higher Neuroticism and lower Conscientiousness were associated with higher PSMU. Mediation results indicated that Neuroticism was indirectly associated with PSMU via both state FoMO (β = 0.10, b = 0.63, Proportion Mediated [PM] = 27.3%, 95% CI [0.36, 0.91]) and trait FoMO (β = 0.05, b = 0.33, PM = 14.3%, 95% CI [0.13, 0.53], p < .001). Conversely, for Conscientiousness, only state FoMO emerged as a significant mediator (β = -0.06, b = -0.48, PM = 33.8%, 95% CI [-0.81, -0.16], p = .002); the indirect pathway via trait FoMO was non-significant (β = -0.02, b = -0.12, 95% CI [-0.28, 0.02], p = .09). These findings suggest that state FoMO, which reflects online-specific anxiety, is a more consistent factor linking personality traits to PSMU than general trait FoMO. This distinction suggests that state FoMO could be considered a potential target for practical interventions, as it is more situational and might be easier to change than personality traits.