Student Cyberloafing In and Out of the Classroom in China and the Relationship with Student Performance

Abstract

This study investigates the in-class and out-of-class cyberloafing activities of students in China, and tests the relationship between those activities and academic performance. A sample of 1,050 undergraduate students at a large University in China reported their in-class (N = 548) and out-of-class (N = 502) cyberloafing activities, which were tested against the students' academic performance. The test results show a negative relationship between in-class cyberloafing and academic performance, but an inverted U-shaped relationship between out-of-class cyberloafing and academic performance. The results support our propositions that cyberloafing is a harmful distraction in the classroom, but can have positive effects when performed in moderation outside the classroom as a means of effort recovery.

Assessing of use of the Internet for personal reasons at lessons at school: A Validation of the Cyberloafing Scale

“…The review of the researches devoted to a cyberloafing shows that this phenomenon is actively studied in a business sphere [13,15,22,24,25,26]. However, it is present at other spheres, for example at the academic system [2,11,22,24,27,28,29]. Researchers note that the sector of education belongs to one of those areas where the Internet is used most intensively [30,31].…”

“…It is motivation, the purposes, the teacher, an environment, time [33], the maintenance of a course, the identity of the pupil and possession of information technologies [22,27]. Researches showed that psychosocial representations, installations and the strategy of training, but not educational motivation influence on cyberloafing behavior at a lesson [11]. Class level, family income and the residence appeared among environment factors which are connected with the cyberloafing level of students [26].…”

“…Researchers come to a conclusion that cyberloafing represents harmful derivation in a class, but can have positive effect, under certain conditions. For example, cyberloafing can be means of restoration of forces [11].…”

“…However, there are also negative effects of use of digital devices (tablets, smartphones, laptops) in a class during a lesson. Such activity poses a serious threat of understanding by the school student of a training material [10], reduces ability of reproduction of the passable material [2] and is negatively connected with academic performance [11]. Domination in network of entertaining content distracts school students from the solution of educational tasks [12].…”

Do Students Really Use Internet Access for Learning in the Classroom?: Exploring Students’ Cyberslacking in an Indonesian University

“…Research shows that cyberslacking effects the results of student learning, and should be considered as an important issue for learning [8][9][10]. If students are busy accessing social media in the classroom, this will result in a decrease in their attention towards the learning materials being used [11].…”