EXPLAIN THE IMPACTS OF SOCIAL MEDIA USE TOWARDS STUDENTS’ ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE.
Introduction
The impact of social media has to some extent affected students’ academic performance both positively and negatively. According to Amin, Mansoor, Hussain and Hashmat (2016, p. 22) ‘Social Media is one of the biggest inventions of technology, which is now most popular and widely used. It is a mean that begun exploding in popularity after the invention of blogging. Hendricks states that by 2006, Facebook and Twitter had become accessible to everyone around the globe (2013, para. 2). We can define social media as a form of electronic communication, social networking and microblogging through which user creates online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content (as videos) (‘Social media’, n.d). Some popular examples of it are Facebook, WhatsApp, WeChat, Instagram, Meetup, Pinterest, Snapchat, Skype, Viber, Flickr, Google +, Tumblr and Twitter, and these usually require devises that are connected to the internet like smart phones and computers in order to operate.
I chose to write this order to explore the effects social media has towards academic performance and determine whether students should continue using it or not. In the following paragraphs below I am going to examine the positive and negative outcomes social media use has towards students’ academic performance beginning with the positive ones.
Strengthens cooperation and teamwork
One of the positive impacts of social media towards academic performance is that it has strengthened students’ cooperation and teamwork among themselves, if used with the right strategy. Furthermore, Dunn (2011, para. 1) states that social networking has boosted the rate and the attribute of collaboration for students. This is possible because students are able to communicate and share content of documents like notes and assignments for example through WhatsApp groups which increases work efficiency and teaches them how to work and relate in groups. In my opinion this situation also would help a student who missed out on classes for reasons like financial constraints and sickness, and unable to make it in class until further recovery, that would help them catch up after a while if they had been taking part in a WhatsApp group and the documents or files of the previous lessons had been shared through it.
Creates awareness
Another positive impact is that it alerts students on academic activities that are going to take place. A research conducted says ‘Pakistan people do have these influences of social media which has enhanced the exposure of the people and created more awareness among the youth. For instance, time tables for exams and due dates for assignments can be shared through social communities like Facebook and WhatsApp. This helps them not to miss out on these academic activities buying them enough time to prepare and able to excel in them. This also makes them aware of classes that have been cancelled or rescheduled and also updates students on university developments and forums which are important to the students’ academics.
Source of information
Social media also acts as a source of information for a better understanding. In addition, the latest study suggests that it can help find extra content to reinforce or acquire more knowledge like looking for YouTube videos and playlists for extra learning, (McGraw Hill Education [Communications Team], (2015, para. 7), where students can go and acquire more data and ideas on the most challenging topics in class. This can help them understand those topics more. Similarly, it can be used to complete assignments such as research hence improving their grades
Improves class participation
The faculty can use social media as a way of getting students to participate. This helps them to interact freely without difficulty since most of them are usually shy in public congregations or classrooms (Hopkins, para. 2). For instance, the faculty or lecturer can ask questions to his or her students through online communities such as twitter, and may answer them easily with use of a hashtag. For this reason the faculty is able know where their students stand as far as the topic asked is concerned. On the side of the students, it helps them broaden their knowledge on what’s asked since they are able to see the views or ideas of their classmates have twitted thus affecting their academic performance positively.
Eases learning
Social media can be used to ease learning in lecture halls at advanced higher levels of educational institutions like universities through video conferencing. Hopkins stated ‘Video conferencing in a classroom is also a significant benefit’ (2017, para. 5). This can easily be done through use of google hangouts available on social networking sites such as google plus. Lecturers can decide to use this in case they are unable to make it in class on time. As a result students are unable to miss out on lectures thus positively affecting their academic performance.
Addictive
On the other hand, social media also got its negative impacts on students’ academic performance. One of them is that it is addictive. One may ask how does this affects their performance, the answer is that since most of them spend most of their time on social media, they end up having less or no time for concentrating on their reading and completing their assignments which may to lead to decline of their grades. Bedassa, (2014), goes ahead and says that students are paying more attention to these social media activities rather than utilising this time for their studies. An example is one may be studying or probing their course material online, then get attracted to these sites in order to kill the boredom in their study time, thus losing track of what they were doing before.
Inability to write without reliance
According to Dunn, (2011) argues that social media reduces students ability to effectively write without relying on the spell check feature. This is true because students spend most of their time on online communities like facebook using a lot of slang or shortened forms of words, an example may be like writing the words numba instead of number, doz instead of those and b4 instead of before. Now one can already tell if these forms of writing are used in an assignment or exam may lead to loss of marks thus contributing negatively.
Depression and Embarrassment.
Social media may be used as a way to spread inappropriate pictures and videos of a student violating their privacy that may lead to depression, if done without their acknowledgement. Furthermore, a study (cited in American Girls: Social Media and the Secret Lives of Teenagers’) discusses that ‘slut pages, where nude photos of a girl, originally sent to one boy, are distributed to others i.e., a sexting ring and then posted on Instagram accounts like ‘[Name of School] Hotties’ or ‘[Name of Town] Hos’ for everyone to view and comment on, often dismissively’ (Dawson, 2016, para. 4.) For example if ones nude pictures are shared or linked and the entire institution gets to find out about them, it lowers the victims’ reputation and self-esteem. This affects them in a way that they will stop coming to school often because of having that feeling of being ashamed to the public. At times they may also be neglected by their friends due to fear of embarrassment leading to great depression thus failing to attend lectures, and then at the end affecting their academic performance negatively.
Influences relationships
Since social media is mostly used for communicating, it has made it easy for students to indulge and build up relationships, which has to some extent led to poor academic performance. This is because they draw their attention away from studies, by spending most of their time attending to their partner by texting each other often. A short survey was conducted and the findings were that ‘The most common way relationships begin and end is by texting. 77% of the teen respondents choose texting as one of the top two ways relationships begin; 82% chose texting as one of the top two ways relationships end (Gowen, 2014, para. 3).
Distraction
Lastly, social media can be a distraction in class while the lecturer is teaching. Usually when a lesson is going on, it’s always important to pay attention to what’s being taught because most of the emphasized points are said then. For example the pros and cons when answering questions in an exam or test, so if not paid attention to may lead to loss of marks. According to Patron, she states that ‘Even while in class, students are on their laptops or smartphone and spend the majority of their time checking their 'home page' and only partially listening to the lecture their teachers. The partial attention students are giving their teachers is not sufficient for getting good grades.’
Conclusion
In conclusion, the influence of social media use towards students’ academic performance has both positive and negative impacts, some of them are it strengthens cooperation and it is a source of information, on the other hand, it is so addictive and a distraction during lessons. I would recommend that one should not stop using social media but would rather create balance between the use of social media and academic performance, starting with reducing on the number of times spent on it in order to improve or maintain there grades.
Reference List
Amin, Z., Mansoor, A., Hussain, S., R., & Hashmat, F. (2016).Impact of Social Media of Student’s Academic. International Journal of Business and Management Invention, 4(5), 22.
Hendricks, D. (2013). Complete History of Social Media: Then and Now. Retrieved from https://smallbiztrends.com/2013/05/the-complete-history-of-social-media-infographic.html
Dunn, J. (2011). The 10 Best and Worst Ways Social Media Impacts Education. Retrieved from https://www.edudemic.com/social-media-education/
Hopkins, B. (n.d.). Advantages of Using Social Media For Students in Education. Retrieved from https://www.academiaapps.com/advantages-social-media-education/
McGraw Hill Education [Communications Team]. (2015). How Social Media Can Help Study. Retrieved from https://www.mheducation.com/blog/thought-leadership/how-social-media-can-help-students-study.html.
Patron, J. (2012). Social Media are Distracting Students. Retrieved from https://www.socialmediaandstudents.blogspot.com
Social Media. (n.d.). In Merriam-Webster dictionary online. Retrieved from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/social%20media
Dawson, M. (2016). How social media is destroying lives of teen girls. New York. Retrieved from https://nypost.com/2016/02/21/how-social-media-is-destroying-the-lives-of-teen-girls/
Gowen, K. (2014). Kris Gowen: Teens on social media’s impact on relationships: Survey. Retrieved from https://www.connectsafely.org/teens-social-medias-impact-relationships-survey/
Bedassa, F. (2014). Impact of Facebook Usage on Students Academic Performance. Retrieved from https://www.grin.com/en/e-book/277559/impact-of-facebook-usage-on-students-academic-performance
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