Communication: Effects of Social Media. Essay Example to Check.

In modern society, the rise in technology has facilitated the advancement of new and quicker methods through which people can interact. Among these is the development of social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. The use of such platforms has increasingly become popular among the young generation. Nevertheless, the frequent usage of social media platforms has caused various negative effects, especially among college students. This essay is a summary of an article that studied the negative effects of social media usage, which describes the purpose of the study, theories used, design or methodology used, research participants, findings and an evaluation.

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Purpose of the study

The study aimed to identify the negative effects of social networks among Asia Pacific University scholars. The authors main goal was to identify the impact of social media technologies on academic performance, health and security of the students in the University (Abdulahi et al., 2014). The addictive use of such technologies has become a major problem among the students as it takes up much of their time. The study of the publication may be linked to communication. This is because the frequent use of social media technologies adversely affects the ability of people to interact and communicate with others directly.

Theory

The author of the article has not made use of any theories as a means of guiding the research. However, the study partly emphasizes on the social exchange theory. This theory suggests that people choose to communicate on social media in the context of costs and rewards (Cropanzano & Mitchell, 2005). Under this theory, reciprocity is negotiated with concepts of approval, respect, power as well as personal satisfaction. These concepts make social media a very addictive technology rather than a means of electronic connectivity. As such, social media has become the leading cause of poor academic performance, poor health, and insecurity among the university students.

Design/Methodology

The methodology used for the study was a quantitative method. This research design proved to be beneficial to the research, as it allowed all the objectives of the study to be attained. This is because the quantitative data that was collected was used to deduct conclusions on the use of social media. As such, with regard to its objectives, the study was ultimately an explanatory study. However, one of the weaknesses of this research was evidenced in the quality of data gathered from some of the participants, due to its inaccuracy. Nevertheless, the strength of this design was apparent, as it allowed the researchers to test theories using the data collected and deduct generalized findings.

Participants

The research participants for this study were university students from the Asian Pacific University. This population was the most appropriate for the study. This is because they are the most affected social media users compared to other populations. In addition, the data collected from this population was capable of representing the entire young population as they exhibit similar behavior.

Discussion/ Findings

The study revealed that the excessive use of social media affects the quality of education as well as students performance. This primarily due to the observation that most of them pay little attention during lectures. During the study, none of the questions from the objectives was left unanswered. However, there were new questions as to whether gender and level of education are valid variables when studying the use of social media.

The authors acknowledged a significant level of bias in the data collected, which proved to be the major limitation. In addition, the authors concluded that the time spent on social media is inversely proportion to the students academic performance. This implicated that students will not be able to meet quality ad standard aimed by the university as long as they are capable of using social media during lectures. The researchers did not, however, indicate what research is to be done next in regards to the issue.

Critique

The information gathered during the research study was accurate as well as reliable. Nevertheless, to have more accurate results, the study would have benefitted greatly by the use of several other data collection techniques. The results recorded by using the different data collection systems would then be compared to attain a comprehensive report or findings.

Conclusion

In conclusion, according to the publication, it is evident that social media technologies have had a significance impact on the academic performance of university students. This is according to the quantitative research design that was employed by the authors, which provided reliable results. The University students used their fellow schoolmates as the research participants for this study since they could provide sufficient data for the research. As such, the authors were able to establish the relationships between social media use and academic performance of students to be inversely proportional. In addition, the study had specific and relevant factors involved, which allowed the authors to make accurate conclusions.

References

Abdulahi, A., Samadi, B., & Gharleghi, B. (2014). A Study on the Negative Effects of Social Networking Sites Such as Facebook among Asia Pacific University Scholars in Malaysia. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 5(10).

Cropanzano, R., & Mitchell, M. S. (2005). Social exchange theory: An interdisciplinary review. Journal of Management, 31(6), 874-900.