Personal Moderation Configurations on Facebook: Exploring the Role of FoMO, Social Media Addiction, Norms, and Platform Trust

TL;DR

This study investigates how psychosocial factors like FoMO, social media addiction, norms, and trust influence Facebook users' use of personal moderation tools, revealing different pathways affecting user safety and moderation engagement.

Contribution

It identifies the psychosocial factors that influence personal moderation tool use on Facebook and explores how these factors impact user safety and platform trust.

Findings

FoMO and social media addiction decrease moderation tool use.

Norms and trust increase moderation tool adoption.

Different psychosocial pathways affect user safety and moderation engagement.

Abstract

Personal moderation tools on social media platforms let users control their news feeds by configuring acceptable toxicity thresholds for their feed content or muting inappropriate accounts. This research examines how four critical psychosocial factors - fear of missing out (FoMO), social media addiction, subjective norms, and trust in moderation systems - shape Facebook users' configuration of these tools. Findings from a nationally representative sample of 1,061 participants show that FoMO and social media addiction make Facebook users more vulnerable to content-based harms by reducing their likelihood of adopting personal moderation tools to hide inappropriate posts. In contrast, descriptive and injunctive norms positively influence the use of these tools. Further, trust in Facebook's moderation systems also significantly affects users' engagement with personal moderation. This analysis highlights qualitatively different pathways through which FoMO and social media addiction make affected users disproportionately unsafe and offers design and policy solutions to address this challenge.