The Formation And Mechanism Of Employee Fear Of Missing Out In Chinese Context

In the process of cross-border integration and accelerated innovation development led by digital economy,the pace of people’s work and life is getting faster and faster.Social media has penetrated into every corner of work and life,blurring the boundary between work and life.People are often in a state of "always online" and "always online".Once they disconnect from the Internet,they will feel anxious and uneasy,which is called "Fear of Missing out"(Fo MO)in psychology.This widespread psychological state of "fear of missing out" will have a great impact on individuals’ psychology and behavior."missing out" in the work situation even cost employees their lives.Thus,"fear of missing out" in the workplace is a potential,pervasive and influential phenomenon that deserves further investigation of employees in an organizational context.How to "stay calm" in the uncertain social environment stirred by the epidemic and get rid of the negative troubles of "Fo MO",so that different types of Fo MO can play the role of "seeking benefits and avoiding harms" in organizations is particularly important.However,since the 2013 "Fo MO" into the academic field of vision,although scholars at home and abroad have gradually explore the different Settings of Fo MO influence on individual’s physical and mental health and behavior,and into the marketing,management,transmission and interdisciplinary research in the field of its mechanism of action,but for Fo MO in the work situation of the research is still more "missing".At present,the research objects of Fo MO at home and abroad mainly focus on teenagers and college students,and the measurement tools are complicated.In 2017,Chinese scholars Zhao Yuxiang,Song Xiaokang et al started the discussion on Fo MO and its influencing factors in domestic journals.They called on the academic community to pay attention to the nature of employees’ behavior and its positive and negative effects in work situations with Fo MO.In 2020,American psychologist Budnick et al introduced Fo MO into the field of work for research,proposed the concept of Fo MO in the workplace and developed a scale of Fo MO applicable to the work situation.However,the alternation of "Confucianism","Buddhism" and "Dao" cultures in China has formed its distinctive cultural characteristics different from those in the West.Chinese traditional cultural characteristics,such as "differential pattern","favor and face" and "hidden rules",make Chinese people’s way of thinking,psychological activities and behavior habits obviously different from those of westerners.Budnick et al.’s research results may not be applicable to the psychology of employees in Chinese workplaces,or they cannot generalize the characteristics of Chinese employees’ Fo MO.Therefore,this study to Chinese enterprise staff as the main research object,based on previous research at home and abroad for Fo MO,in preface-structure and human feelings and face,unwritten rules,such as Chinese culture context,the social cognitive theory and the theory of social information processing as explained in the psychological process of target and S-O-R model framework,based on the grounded theory,Using qualitative and quantitative methods,this thesis explores the formation and mechanism of employee Fo MO in Chinese context.The main conclusions of this study are as follows:First,in the first study,primary and secondary qualitative data were collected through focus interviews,one-to-one interviews,news and forum comments,etc.Based on grounded theory,the connotation,characteristics and structural dimensions of Chinese employees’ Fo MO were sorted out and analyzed,and an initial measurement scale of Chinese employees’ Fo MO was developed.Based on the existing theoretical and qualitative researches on Fo MO,this study considers that Chinese employees’ Fo MO is a kind of widespread anxiety caused by employees’ fear of missing useful information,social relations,career development opportunities and work welfare.This kind of Fo MO comes not only from online social media,but also from the real world,and is often closely related to employees’ own work needs and interests.Chinese employees’ Fo MO mainly has four core dimensions,namely,job information Fo MO,workplace relationship Fo MO,career development Fo MO and work welfare Fo MO.Then,for different employee groups,this study collected two questionnaire samples successively.With sample 1,SPSS22.0 was used to conduct exploratory factor analysis on the Chinese employee Fo MO Scale developed by this study.Finally,a formal scale with 12 items and four dimensions was formed,which had good reliability and validity.Sample 2 was used to conduct confirmatory factor analysis on the revised Chinese employee Fo MO Scale using Mplus 8.3 to further test the reliability,validity and differentiation of the scale.On this basis,sample 3 was collected again in this study,and the predictive test of the Chinese employees’ Fo MO Scale was conducted by using turnover intention,voice behavior and job burnout,which further verified that the scale had good reliability and validity and could meet the needs of empirical research and be used to measure the level of Chinese employees’ Fo MO.This study also found that Chinese employees’ Fo MO had a positive predictive effect on turnover intention,job burnout and voice behavior.Second,through qualitative research,this research based on grounded theory of 19 interview object interview data analysis found that the formation of Chinese employees Fo MO and mechanism with the influence of the hierarchical characteristics,Fo MO factors of employees from organization,group and individual level of a variety of factors,and the employee Fo MO work for employees’ physical and mental health and behavior has both negative effects,there are also positive effects.In terms of the formation factors of Chinese employees’ Fo MO,this study found that the cause of Chinese employees’ Fo MO is a multi-level influence mechanism.Individual differences,group interaction and internal and external environment of the organization may lead to Chinese employees’ Fo MO.In the work situation,the formation factors of Chinese employees’ Fo MO mainly include three aspects: individual level,group level and organization level.Individual level factors such as personality trait,psychological need and mobile phone use directly affect employees’ Fo MO.Authoritarian leadership,perceived organizational politics,workplace exclusion and other group-level factors will directly or indirectly affect employees’ Fo MO through individual differences.Organizational factors such as environmental uncertainty and fault-tolerant atmosphere also have direct or indirect effects on employees’ Fo MO through individual differences.In terms of the influencing factors of Chinese employees’ Fo MO,the influence of Chinese employees’ Fo MO on employees can play a role in the physiological and psychological aspects of employees,as well as work behavior and work results,among which,there are both positive and negative effects,therefore,Chinese employees Fo MO on the physical and mental health of employees and work behavior plays a "double-edged sword effect".Specifically,the impact of employee Fo MO on employees’ physical and mental health is mainly reflected in two aspects: on the one hand,employee Fo MO can affect sleep,produce negative emotions,cause job burnout,affect job engagement,and lead to work-family conflict;On the other hand,employee Fo MO can also cause employees to reflect on themselves.Chinese employees Fo MO influence on employee’s work behavior is reflected in two aspects: on the one hand,employees Fo MO can lead to the dependence and addiction of employees for mobile phones,turnover intention,gift giving behavior,impact performance etc.,on the other hand,employees Fo MO will also increase employees’ autonomous learning and advice behavior,and show more care behavior.It can be seen from the performance of Chinese employees’ Fo MO in both physical and mental health and work behavior that Chinese employees’ Fo MO has "double-edged sword effect" on employees’ physical and mental health and work behavior.Thirdly,based on the questionnaire data of 245 employees of a company in Beijing,this study conducted an empirical study on the mechanism of Chinese employees’ Fo MO as a mediator.The results showed that employees’ cultural perception of error aversion had a positive impact on employees’ turnover intention.Chinese employees’ Fo MO also has a positive impact on turnover intention,and partly mediates the relationship between employees’ cultural perception of error aversion and turnover intention.In addition,the empirical study also found that the clarity of employees’ roles alleviates the positive impact of employees’ cultural perception of error aversion on employees’ error anxiety,that is,the clearer employees’ role perception is,the smaller the positive impact of employees’ cultural perception of error aversion on employees’ error anxiety.At the same time,this study further verified the mediating effect of employee role clarity alleviating employee Fo MO on the relationship between employee cultural perception of error and employee turnover intention.To sum up,this study response calls for research of expanding Fo MO from China preface-structure and human feelings and face,rules and other traditional cultural context,to Chinese employees Fo MO concept,structure and exploratory research on the influence mechanism,built a integrated Chinese employees Fo MO formation and mechanism theory frame.This study makes the study of Fo MO in Chinese work situation more "grounded",expands the study of Fo MO theory and enrichis the theory of local organization management.At the same time,this study also lays a foundation for subsequent researches on employee Fo MO in The Chinese context,and provides a theoretical basis for managers and employees to recognize Fo MO and play its role of seeking benefits and avoiding harms.