The growth of technology towards the end of the 20^th century in Africa propelled by the emergence of the internet, satellite, cable data, transmission and computer assisted equipment has moved the continent to an interactive stage with electronic gadgets, called social media. Social media is a form of electronic communication which facilitates interaction among various groups, regardless of age, sex, religion etc. Social media are medium for social, academic and business interaction, using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media use web-based technologies to transform and broadcast media monologues into social dialogues such as Facebook, Skype, My Space, Twitter, WhatsApp, 2go, etc [1]. There is abundant evidence that millions of people across the world use social media on regular basis for various reasons [2]. Though social media use cuts across all age groups, studies have however shown that it is predominant among young person’s [3].

Researchers have argued that social media distracts the attention and concentration of students toward learning and converts it towards non-educational activities such as baseless and unnecessary chatting, but these social media can be useful for education based on sound pedagogical principles [4]. This trend makes learning  and   understanding by  student’s  very   difficult task. Social media addiction can cause a fall in the time spent on studies, major drop in grades, low interest in extracurricular activities and lack of interest in classes. According to Anagbogu, Idajor and Owan [5]. Social media has become a medium of examination malpractice, this has not only discouraged reading and responding to academic activities as most of the student felt more on the short cuts of social media activities. It was recommended that a seminar be organize for the students to educate them on the use of mobile phones.

Given the foregoing therefore, this study seeks to examine the effect of social media on the academic performance of undergraduate students in Cross River State Nigeria.

The Problem

It is a common sight to see a youth or adults chatting in sensitive and highly organized places like church, mosque, conference halls, and school. Some are carried away that even as they are walking along the high way, they keep chatting, without taking notice of the ongoing or incoming vehicles. Also worrisome is the fact that the cost of acquiring an expensive phone that is compliant to chatting might send students to wrongly acquire the cash needed for it. Attention has been shifted from visible to invisible friends, while important ventures like study and writing are affected in the process, as most student use short forms in communicating, and this has correspondingly affected the their writing skills, this is so because in most phone written messages, short forms are used for communication. This phenomenon has become a source of worry to many who believe in knowledge and skill acquisition.

Despite these claims, Anagbogu and Owor [6], in their study of school factors as correlates to examination malpractice found that the cause of failure is not limited to social media, but class size, teachers’ commitment and school facilities.

Whether these opportunities promote studies is a question that needs to be answered. Thus, this study investigated the impact of social media on the academic performance of undergraduate students in university of Calabar, Cross River State.

Objectives of The Study

The purpose of this study generally is to examine the effect of social media on the academic performance of undergraduate students in the University of Calabar. Specifically, the study seeks to:

• Examine the proportion of students who make use of social media.

• Examine the purpose of social media usage by students.

• Ascertain how much time students spend on social media.

• Identify the most frequently used social network by students.

• Examine if social media influence students’ academic performance

Research Questions

• What is the proportion of undergraduate students who use social media in the University?

• Why do undergraduate students use social media?

• How much time do undergraduate students spend in social media in a day?

• Which is the most frequently used social media platform among undergraduate students?

• To what extent does social media influence undergraduate students’ academic program in research methods?

Statement of Hypothesis

• Social media involvement does not significantly influence undergraduate students’ academic performance.

The study engaged a survey design. It was carried out in University of Calabar. With a sample of 860 students randomly selected from all the Faculties and Departments in the University through stratified random sampling and accidental sampling processes. The population of the study covered all undergraduates’ students in all the Faculties/institutes and Departments in the university. The instruments used for data collection were a questionnaire and test on research methods, designed by the researcher, the reliability and validity of the instrument was established, it ranged from 0.72-0.87 respectively. The descriptive statistics was then used to profile the responses from the respondents and Analysis of Variance was used to analyze the data at .05 level of significance.

Data Analyses

Data analyses were carried out with the use of descriptive statistics and Analysis of variance (ANOVA) at .05 level of significance. First, the research question is stated, followed by the presentation of responses as analysed.

Research Question One

What is the proportion of undergraduate students who use social media in the University? In response to this question, descriptive statistics was used to analyze the data.

The information in Table 1 reveal that students between the ages of 19- 30 years are more engross in social media activities this is so because out of 860 students 559 were seen to be engrossed in social media activities. This finding supports the findings of [3]. Who observed that social media use cuts across all age groups, but more?

Table 1: Demographic Information of Sample (N = 860)

predominant among young persons

Table 2 show that 732 (85.12%) of the student-respondent use social media; while,  123(14.88%) own personal social media account; 721 (98.50%) own personal social media accounts while 11(1.5%) do not own social media accounts; 695 (96.39%) claim to have personal phones while 26(3.61%) do not have personal phones for social media activities. 545 (96.61%) use their phones for social media activities while 25(4.39%) do not. 601(89.17%) agreed to have used social media for up to 2 years, while 73(10.83%) were seen as beginners in the use of social media.

Table 2: Social Media use

From Table 3, the purpose for using social media by respondents are news/information 660 (90.16%), communication 520 (70.04%), school assignment 680 (92.90%), academic/research work 560 (75.00%), games 300 (40.98%), entertainment 560 (76.50%), making friends 420(53.35%), and chatting with friends 702(95.90%). This implies that most students use their greater time to chart with others. This might be seen as a distraction to some of the students as this might not be part of their academic request.

Table 3: Purpose for using social media

Table 4 shows the amount of time the students spend on social media which indicated that 380 (51.91%) spent below 1 hour, 420 (53.38%) spenOt between 1-2 hours, 448 (61.20%) spent between 3 – 5 hours while 257 (35.11%) spent above 6 hours on internet activities. This finding reveal that most students spend up to 3-5 hours a day in chatting and other involvements in the social media plat forms. The question that comes is what time or how many minutes do they really spend in reading? This finding is in line with the findings of Kuppuswamy and Narayan, [4]. Who claim that the trend makes learning and understanding by student’s very difficult task? Social media addiction can cause a fall in the time spent on studies, thereby resulting to a drop in grades, low interest in extracurricular activities and lack of interest in reading and other curricular related activities.

Table 4: Time Spent on Social Media

Table 5 shows that the commonly used social media network among the student-respondents are: WhatsApp, Facebook, instagram, My space, 2go, YouTube, Printrest and google. In terms of the most frequently used social media network type, 662 (90.43%) respondents use Google, followed by Facebook 622 (84.97%), whatsup had 612(83.61), you tub had 218(29.78%) and least was Instagram 66(9.01%). Students did not indicate the use of my space and 2go in their interaction Hypothesis 1: Social media involvement has no significant influence on students’ academic performance.

Table 5: Most frequently used social media Network Type

The result in Table 6 reveals that the calculated significant level value is 0.137 which is higher than the significance level of 0.05, therefore, there is no basis for rejecting the null hypothesis and hence the alternate hypothesis is accepted. This implies that, social media involvement has no significant influence on academic performance of students of students who use social media and students who do not use social media in the University of Calabar. This finding corroborates earlier findings as pointed out by Anagbogu, Idajor & Owan [5]. The university students have rather device means of using social media in perpetrating examination malpractice in various ways.

Table 6: One-way analysis of variance table showing the influence of social media involvement on academic performance of undergraduate students.

Significant at 0.05 level; df=2, 727; F=36.136; P-level = 0.000

In this study, findings indicated that majority of the undergraduate students used social media including WhatsApp, Facebook, instagram, My space, 2go, YouTube, Print rest and Google. They use these social media sites for different purposes other than learning related activities. It is found that, Facebook is the most frequently used social media network by the respondents. Similarly, it is noted that majority of them spend 1 – 6 hours on social media daily. Personally owned mobile phone and personal social media account contributed immensely in providing easy access to social media services among undergraduate students in the University of Calabar. Finally, it is found that social media involvement has no significant influence on students’ academic performance.

Recommendations

Resulting from the findings, the researchers recommended that should set their mobile phones on silent during school hours and a seminar are organize to educate students on the use of time especially as it relates to the use of mobile handsets.

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2. Daluba, N.E., and C.E.O. Maxwell. “Effect of Social Media on the Use of Academic Library by Undergraduate Students in Tertiary Institutions: A Case Study of Kogi State University.

3. Onuoha, U.D., and F.O. Saheed. “Perceived Influence of Online Social Networks on Academic Performance: A Case Study of Undergraduates in Selected Universities in Ogun State, Nigeria.” The Information Manager, vol. 11, no. 1, 2011, pp. 6–13.

4. Kuppuswamy, S., and P. Narayan. “The Impact of Social Networking Websites on the Education of Youth.” International Journal of Virtual Communities and Social Networking (IJVCSN), vol. 2, no. 1, 2010, pp. 67–79.

5. Anagbogu, G.E., et al. “Socio-Economic Factors as Attributes for Examination Malpractice among Secondary School Students in Cross River State-Nigeria.” International Journal of Education and Research, vol. 4, no. 2, 2016, pp. 31–38. Dhaka, Bangladesh.

6. Anagbogu, G.E., and E.O. Owor. “School Factors as Correlates to Examination Malpractice among Secondary School Students in Cross River State, Nigeria.” Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, vol. 2, no. 4, 2021, pp. 31–34.