ДУМСКРОЛЛИНГ КАК ФАКТОР ФИНАНСОВОГО БЛАГОПОЛУЧИЯ: МЕДИАЦИОННАЯ РОЛЬ ФИНАНСОВОГО СТРЕССА

Abstract:
Against the backdrop of growing economic and geopolitical uncertainty, the study of psychological mechanisms through which digital consumption of negative information is linked to the subjective experience of one’s own financial situation is becoming especially relevant. One such mechanism may be financial stress, which makes it possible to consider doomscrolling not only as a media-behavioral practice, but also as a form of emotionally charged interaction with an anxiety-provoking information environment. The aim of the study was to identify the relationship between doomscrolling and subjective financial well-being, as well as to test the mediating role of financial stress in this relationship. The study involved 555 respondents aged 18 to 90 years (M = 37.55; SD = 11.97) who participated in an online survey. The study used the APR-FSS financial stress scale, including affective, physiological, and interpersonal components, the subjective financial well-being questionnaire, which makes it possible to distinguish the factors of financial vulnerability and financial confidence, and the doomscrolling scale in its Russian-language adaptation. Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient and mediation analysis were used for data processing in order to assess the direct and indirect effects of doomscrolling on financial well-being indicators through different components of financial stress. The results showed that doomscrolling was statistically significantly associated with all three subscales of financial stress, with the strongest associations found for the physiological and interpersonal components. The mediation analysis showed that each of the three financial stress subscales, considered separately, mediated the relationship between doomscrolling and both aspects of subjective financial well-being. In the case of financial vulnerability, the indirect effects were positive, whereas in the case of financial confidence they were negative. It was concluded that doomscrolling is associated with the deterioration of subjective financial well-being through stress mechanisms affecting the emotional, physiological, and interpersonal spheres.