Nomophobia, anxiety, and social comparison orientation: Associations with physical health symptoms among college students

Objectives: Nomophobia is characterized by distress about being without one’s mobile phone and is associated with negative health outcomes, particularly for college students. However, the unique contributions of nomophobia versus global anxiety and the role of social comparison orientation (SCO) is not clear. Participants: 310 college students (M_Age = 19.43; 66% women; 34% racial/ethnic minority identity). Methods: Cross-sectional survey using validated measures of nomophobia, anxiety, SCO, and physical health symptoms. Results: Including nomophobia did not improve model fit relative to anxiety alone for predicting symptoms (ΔR² = 0.003, p = 0.32). There was no interaction between nomophobia and SCO (R² = 0.01, p = 0.12), though the interaction between anxiety and SCO was significant (R² = 0.03, p = 0.01). Conclusions: Global anxiety may be more useful for identifying students at risk for physical health symptoms than nomophobia. Future work elucidating whether nomophobia is an appropriate treatment target for managing anxiety-related and/or physical health symptoms could help improve the health of college students.