Benefits derived from use of social media by researchers for agricultural information in Ibadan Metropolis, Oyo State

Abstract

This study investigated benefits derived from use of social media by researchers for agricultural information in Ibadan Metropolis, Oyo State. Random sampling techniques were used through questionnaire to collect information from 112 researchers. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics of frequency counts, percentage, mean and Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) at 0.05% level of significance. Results of analysis revealed that majority of the respondents were male and are of middle age, many have B.Sc. while few had M.Sc. with most of them married, and 6-10years of experience as researchers. The result further reveals that larger percentage of the respondent 75.9% and 82.1% regularly makes use of Facebook and WhatsApp respectively. The result showed that benefits derived from use of social media has high percentage of the respondent and also encourages them to reach out to their colleagues across their organization, helps to connect peers with similar research interest leading to collaboration on new projects, promotes the flow of communication and desire to share knowledge with others and the role of social media to establish connections, create awareness and promote individual or organizational project or research reports and feedback. The result further shows that there are some constraints faced through the usage of social media as agreed with by the respondent that one of the major constraint is Network congestion as well as irregular power supply. The result also revealed that there is no significant relationship between benefits derived from the respondents (r = 0.044, p>0.05) and use of social media. This implies that benefit derived from the use of social media for research work is similar or not different from the benefit derived from the individual who uses social medial for fun. It is therefore recommend that every agricultural researcher should subscribe to and maintains multiple accounts social media and also encouraged to used social media network and collaborate with colleagues institutes different from their own. Agricultural researchers should used social media to get mentors and mentees in order to keep their profession alive.