Social Media Use

Social Media Use: An Exploratory Test of Effects on the Daily Lives of College Students
Research Articles
ABSTRACT This study covers the effects that social media use has on the daily lives of college students. More specifically, the current study focuses on college students academic success, study habits, social interaction, and family interaction. Social media is a source of online tools that allow people from across the world to communicate with others. This growing trend has become very popular among those who use the internet on a daily basis, especially students. Social media has become so popular that many businesses now use it to advertise their products and colleges use it to connect with their current and future students. Because social media use is becoming more and more popular every day, college students find themselves spending the majority of their time online. Using social media excessively reduces the time that students spend studying. This can cause lowered academic standing, bad grades, and loss of scholarships. Students can also see their social and family lives become affected by social media use. Although being online allows people to have easier communication, it can also cause problems. The best research tool to use for contacting college students is the survey method because it can accurately cover a variety of people and their lifestyles. Introduction Todays college students are the most wired generation in history. Also known as the Net Generation or the Millennials, college students use technology such as internet, e-mail, blogs, and social networks in their everyday repertoire of communication and connection tools at a higher rate than individuals from any other generation (Junco & Cole-Avent, 2008). Social networking sites are websites that encourage people to establish a network of connections to others. In 2007, Kay defined social media as unique because it allows the ability to define ones own social network and interact in new ways. Indeed, users on many of these sites arent looking to meet new people but to communi
Barbara Barnett Katherine Cothern Arkansas State University
cate with others who are already part of their social network (Acar, 2008). Schwalbe (2009) called this engaging in naked conversations, meaning those involved in social networking bare their souls to family, friends, and even the world. The purpose of our research is to examine social media and its influence on the everyday lives of college students from academic success and study habits to social satisfaction and family interaction. Schwalbe (2009) conducted a survey that found 18-24-year-old college students lead intensely social lives (p.60). He also stated that the Millennials life-long interaction with digital media has created students who think and process information fundamentally different from their predecessors (p.63). The growth of social media and its effects on young adults can be seen in The Social Network, a movie released in 2010 describing the foundation behind Facebook and how it changed the world of technology and communication. The effect of social media can also be seen in the 2008 U.S. Presidential election. Barack Obama and his campaign leaders created a social networking site, my.barackobama.com, to recruit thousands of U.S. citizens to participate in door-knocking and precinctwalking (Valenzuela, Park, & Kee, 2009). The social media efforts helped the campaign prosper. Social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter arent the only component of social media. Other social media tools, such as blogs and instant messaging, have also gained quite a bit of attention over the past few years. Blogging involves posting information in dated entries. Junco (2008) found that 27.9 percent of college students reported owning a blog, while 44.4 percent reported reading them for about an hour each week. Instant messaging involves using specific software applications to engage in a real time back-and-forth exchange. In 2007, 75.5 percent of college students used instant messaging and stayed logged on for a median of thirty-five hours a week (Junco & Cole-Avent, 2008). For college students, nothing is more important than staying connected through networking, content sharing, and messaging (Schwalbe, 2009) but how does this truly affect college students, mainly those that attend Arkansas State University? Does frequent exposure to social media sites lead to bad study habits? Do bad study habits lead to lower academic success in college? Does social media use positively or negatively affect the social life of college students? Does social media use increase or decrease family involvement? The only way to confirm our speculations is to conduct research involving college students, themselves. We will be examining the relationship among four variables. In all, social media has brought a whole new meaning to the world of communication. Whether you hear them called the Net generation, the Millennials, Digital Natives, or Generation Y, college students know more about social media than any other generation before them. They stay up-to-date with the latest news, gossip, and relationship status changes. Acar (2008) said it best: Undoubtedly these [social media] tools enable us to connect with each other more than ever before (p.63). Literature Review The purpose of this study is to identify the affects of
Volume 1 Issue 1 Spring 2011
Journal of International Students 9

Social Media Use

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Social Media Use: An Exploratory Test of Effects on the Daily Lives of College Students

Barbara Barnett Katherine Cothern Arkansas State University

Volume 1 Issue 1 Spring 2011

Journal of International Students 9

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