A boxer moving one's body away from an opponent's blows so as to lessen the impact. Adapt oneself to adverse circumstances. That was the definition a few weeks ago. Now I see a toilet roll standing for our resistance to the coronavirus. The more we have, the safer we are.
The articles tell me we have a fear of missing out - known as FOMO. The definition includes: "often aroused by posts seen on a social media website." It is also commonly associated with bucket list pressure. The combination in travel is known as FOMOtravel.
There is JOMO - the joy of missing out. There's advice on how to turn FOMO into JOMO. All of these articles are all targeted to the under-25 generation.
So what are the explanations on the toilet paper trail? It didn't look like 25 year-olds in the grocery line-ups. Could FOMO be contagious?
According to Psychology Today, this is a type of herding instinct and falls within the area of mob theory where the mob takes on a life and personality of its own, separate and distinct from individuals within it. Psychology Today weighed in on March 8th with behavioural economics and the tulip bubble:
So what does behavioural economics and finance tell us about why someone would rush to spend excessive amounts on what is ordinarily a trivial item? The behavioural literature on speculative bubbles provides some potential explanations. One of the more colourful examples of a speculative bubble is Tulipmania: for a brief period in 1637, speculators got very excited about tulip bulbs. At the height of Tulipmania, one of the most prized bulbs, the exotic Semper Augustus, sold for around 1,000 florins — enough money to buy a smart townhouse, a small fleet of battleships or a drove of 3,000 pigs. Tulipmania is often cited as a classic example of extreme irrationality, but someone believing that they had a good chance of selling a tulip bulb for $1.1m, would not be stupid to buy it for $1m.
This theory is dismissed, as most people are hoarding and not reselling. They decided it is the herding instinct and mob behaviour.
We've moved FOMO to the stock market and the drops are being called FOCO - fear of the coronavirus outbreak.
All age groups are getting acquainted with FOMO as the days progress. I guess it is contagious.
Longwood Gardens is closed, so the wisteria will have to be appreciated from previous years. I look at this as a variation of FOMO. I think of this one as Regret of missing out - ROMO.
