Haunted by what you are missing: when and how fear of missing out influences sleep quality

The widespread use of smartphones and social media has led to new psychological phenomena that affect sleep quality among university students. One such phenomenon, the Fear of Missing Out (FoMO), has garnered growing research attention. However, the factors underlying this relationship remain insufficiently explored. This study examines the mediating role of false mobile sensations in the link between FoMO and sleep quality. It also investigates how digital detachment ability and sensitivity to techno-fatigue influence this relationship. Using a three-wave explanatory survey design, data were collected from 1,074 undergraduate students at several universities in Ghana. Participants completed adapted questionnaires, and the Model 7 of the PROCESS macro for SPSS was employed to analyze the proposed model. The results indicated that false mobile sensation mediates the significant connection between FoMO and sleep quality. Furthermore, both digital detachment ability and sensitivity to techno-fatigue moderated the relationship between FoMO and sleep quality. This study offers a unique contribution by presenting a mediated dual-moderation framework that incorporates false mobile sensation as a novel mediator and identifies digital detachment and techno-fatigue sensitivity as boundary conditions in the FoMO–sleep quality relationship, especially within a Sub-Saharan African university context.