The immortality trap: Terror management in the digital context

Grounded in Terror Management Theory (TMT), this theoretical paper explores how digital technologies reshape pathways to symbolic immortality. Digital environments both offer new routes-through self-esteem, cultural worldviews, close relationships, and legacy tools-and introduce vulnerabilities such as fragmented meaning, fragile validation, and diminished control. A classification framework based on interactivity and volition is proposed to differentiate forms of digital legacy and immortality. Through this lens, the paper theorizes how digital defenses may vary in symbolic and psychological function when facing death anxiety. Building on this foundation, the paper conceptualizes the immortality trap, a paradox where the preservation of digital presence undermines the transmission of existential meaning. It ultimately argues that symbolic immortality in the digital age cannot rely on data preservation alone; rather, it must involve the intentional transmission of values and meaning to sustain existential coherence and cultural continuity.