THE IMPACT OF SMART MOBILE DEVICES AND ONLINE PLATFORMS FOR SOCIAL INTERACTION ON THE ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT OF SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background of the study: The world is a big interconnected community that is united through a network of wired and wireless devices via the World Wide Web (WWW). The majority of individuals today possess a presence in the digital realm, courtesy of email accounts, online purchases, and e-learning. Social networking sites are the primary application within the realm of social media during the Web 2.0 era. Social media is the most rapidly expanding web application in the twenty-first century. The issue of technology addiction has garnered significant attention, especially in the realm of secondary school, due to the heightened susceptibility of adolescents to addiction. Nevertheless, the problem of smartphone addiction has escalated in importance. Smartphones, as identified by Pew Research Centre (2015), are the most recent iteration of mobile phones that have emerged in recent times and have already achieved widespread market dominance. Smartphones equipped with miniature keyboards are not just ordinary phones, but also encompass computer functionalities such as email, calendar, and address book. Additionally, they offer office applications for viewing and modifying documents. The multimedia capabilities of a phone, such as its camera, video recording, sound recording, and podcasting functionalities, are highly advanced and can rival specialised equipment. Due to the widespread availability of advanced features in modern mobile phones, particularly 3G and 4G phones, such as MP3 and Internet capabilities, as well as the decrease in size and cost of these devices, mobile phones have become quite common. The mobile phone is a versatile device that enables users to perform tasks quietly or publicly, regardless of time or location. Regular mobile phone users may struggle to distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate usage boundaries (Duberstein 2019).

Currently, social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Skype, Instagram, and others are widely used by college students in today's technological era (Gane & Beer, 2018). Due to the increasing popularity of wireless technology, accessing these social networking sites has become more convenient and effortless. Consequently, there has been a significant increase of more than one billion users using these websites every day. Individuals between the ages of 18 and 29, commonly referred to as young adults, are the primary consumers of cellular technology, making up 81% of the total user base (Lenhart, Purcell, Smith & Zickuhr, 2010). College students have a pronounced demand for social networking services. According to a study conducted by Junco and Cotton in 2012, 92% of undergraduate students utilise social media. As more college students utilise social media, it is vital for academics and administrators at higher education institutions to understand how this affects students' academic performance.

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The invention of technology such as mobile phones has no doubt brought about immense positive progress to human societies, but this invention equally brought about in its wake some observed attitudinal problems among secondary schools students. However, this is not to say that these problems are solely caused by the usage of these phones as there are other causes, but that the attitudes of the users and the modes of the usage are significantly the contributing factors especially in the 21st century. Scholars have identified the problems associated with the phone usage and time (Junco, Merco and Salter, 2010_Wei and Lo, 2006), the attachment to phones (Gaser, 2006), in the face of this, therefore, there is the need to establish the link between these observations and academic performance. In analyzing the problem of these internet phones, and in order to synchronize and have a clearer understanding of the problem as it is related- to this study, it must be borne in mind that other varying platforms of distractions towards the academic performance of the secondary school students are also implicated, such as the computer usages, which generate internet social networking sites, and the visual display devices for relaxation such as televisions.

In addition to this, there is high tendency of students to interact with their phone in the class in the course of lectures, either to respond to received messages, or to browse the internet. These, no doubt, take a heavy toll on the level of concentration devoted to the lectures. Even while outside the classroom environment, most students who use internet enabled phones devotes much time interacting with their phones by chatting on Twitter 2go, Facebook, Instant messages (Bbm, Yahoo messenger). Consequently, the time that ought to have been devoted to study and other useful academic endeavours are thus frittered away.

​​​​​​​OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY

The general purpose of the study is to determine the influence of smart phones and social networking sites on the academic performance of secondary schools students and they are stated below:

1. To determine the influence of smart phones on academic performance of school students.

2. To ascertain the influence of social networks on the academic performance of students.

3. To determine the influence of social networks  on  student study habit.

4. To ascertain the influence of smart phones on students level of concentration in class.

5. To determine the influence of social networks on students access to learning materials.

1.4 RESEARCH HYPOTHESES

For the successful completion of the study, the following research hypotheses were formulated by the researcher;  

H0:    There is no significant influence between smartphones and students academic performance.

H1:  There is significant influence between smartphones and students academic performance.

H02:  There is no significant influence between social networks and students' access to learning materials.

H2:  There is significant influence between social networks and students' access to learning materials.

​​​​​​​SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

As said earlier, this study is about the influence of smart phones usage and social networking sites on academic performance of secondary school students. This study will be useful to students, parents, teachers, school administrator and school counselor. The students as the receiver of knowledge in the school will understand the ways by which usage of smart phones can affect their learning performance. Teachers in schools will find these work useful as it will provide the rationale for ensuring that students are been told how and when to use smart phones and the ways they can benefit from social sites. The school administrator will see this work as one that can be relied on and as such come up with rules that can put the commendation of this study into action. The counselor as a professional will apply knowledge gain from this work by putting students through the use of smart phones and social networking sites, thereby assisting them to perform well in their studies.

​​​​​​​SCOPE AND LIMITATION OF THE STUDY

The scope of this study will be limited to Senior Secondary Schools in Educational Districts (iv) of Mainland Local Government Area of Lagos State. It is worthy to note that smart phones and social networking sites will be treated as two separate variables affecting academic performance. The researcher encounters some constrain which limited the scope of the study;

 a) AVAILABILITY OF RESEARCH MATERIAL: The research material available to the researcher is insufficient, thereby limiting the study

b) TIME: The time frame allocated to the study does not enhance wider coverage as the researcher has to combine other academic activities and examinations with the study.

c) Organizational privacy: Limited Access to the selected auditing firm makes it difficult to get all the necessary and required information concerning the activities   

​​​​​​​DEFINITION OF TERMS

i.         Smart Phone: any mobile communication device capable of accessing the Internet.

ii.         Social networking sites or Social media: a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0and that allows the creation and exchange of user generated context (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010).

iii.         BYOD (Bring Your Own Device): trend of using iPads, iPhones, Andriod phones, and sometimes even their own laptops, and expecting to use this to gain access to corporate educational data(Miller, 2012).

iv.         Mobile Learning: use of mobile or wireless devices for the purpose of learning while on the move or learning that takes advantage of mobile technologies.

v.         Student: a person who studies at a school, college or university.