The dark side of smartphone application’s smart push function: Exploring its impact on fear of missing out and smartphone addiction

Abstract

This article aims to investigate the negative effects of smart push technology, which is becoming increasingly popular in digital devices and online services, particularly in smartphone-based applications (apps). Specifically, empirical relationships among the features of the app content delivered by smart push technology, fear of missing out, and smartphone addiction are explored by constructing an integrated model. The proposed relationships were tested by analyzing survey-based data collected from 227 valid samples through partial least squares-structural equation modeling. The analysis confirmed the hypothesized positive relationships among the features of app content delivered by smart push technology (entertainment and timeliness) in smartphone-based apps, fear of missing out, and smartphone addiction. Moreover, fear of missing out served as a mediator between the features of smart push technology and smartphone addiction. This study makes a significant theoretical contribution to the digital communication technology and smartphone addiction literature by revealing the influence mechanism of smart push technology on smartphone addiction. Furthermore, this study has a number of practical implications for policymakers as well as app developers.