The Impact of Social Media Participation on Academic Performance in Undergraduate and Postgraduate Students

Abstract

The main objective of this study was to analyse the influence of social media participation on academic performance. The sample consisted of 1960 students taking one of two courses at undergraduate or postgraduate level, respectively (Faculty of Education, National Distance Education University, Spain), of whom 411 students carried out an activity based on social media participation. We used a mixed quantitative (descriptive analysis and ANOVA) and qualitative (content analysis) design. Our results showed that the students who participated in a social media-based activity presented better academic performance than those who did not carry out any activity or who took part in a more traditional learning activity. We conclude that regardless of educational level, social media participation exerts a positive influence on performance. Consequently, it is important to consider the variable of social networking site use because this can partially explain academic performance. We also found that the networks generated during the course did not constitute stable communities of practice. Our main recommendation is that three stages of instruction should be considered when designing a course based on social media participation: beginners, intermediate, and professional.

The Influence of Class Participation and Course Project in Final Grade in The Context of Online Teaching

“…So, class participation predicts strongly final grade of the students at the university level. Therefore, class participation is an important variable that should considered to support by faculty members to increase academic achievements of the students The result was consistent with previously reported works (Galyon, Blondin, Yaw, Nalls, & Williams, 2012;Cui, & Coleman, 2020;Pérez-López, & Ibarrondo-Dávila, 2020;Bailey et al, 2020;Santoveña-Casal, 2019;Bek, 2017;Nieuwoudt, 2020;Fematt, et al, 2021;Delfino, 2019;Sezer, Inel, Seçkin, & Uluçinar, 2017;Sothan, 2019;Bielinska-Kwapisz, 2015;Tran, & Pham, 2019), which found out that class participation predicts the final grade. In conclusion hypothesis # 1: The final grade of students described by class participation, is supported.…”

“…In a blended learning environment, students are too motivated to involve in out-of-classroom activities (Cui & Coleman, 2020); at the same time, Pérez-López & Ibarrondo-Dávila (2020), as well as Xhomara, Stošić & Tomczyk (2019) show that academic progress is directly related, in a positive and significant way to students' priorly interest in the course, the usefulness of the course, prior academic achievement, and applying material learned in practice. Individual backgrounds showed the important role in predicting the academic achievements of undergraduate students (Sothan, 2019;Bailey et al, 2020);and Santoveña-Casal (2019) showed that students who took part in a social media-based activity showed better academic performance than students who did not carry out any learning activity or who took part in a more traditional learning approach. Sikhwari, Dama, Gadisi & Matodzi (2020), indicated that academic as well as social engagement of students at university is important for study commitment, progress, and dropping out preventing; meanwhile, leadership style, feelings of isolation and lack of future aspiration significantly impact teacher-student interaction, and academic performance of students in complex ways (Xhomara, 2018;Bek, 2017).…”

The Impact of Social Networks on Students’ Academic Achievement in Practical Programming Labs

“…The first selected research from Spain [9]. A sample of 1960 students who were studying one of two courses at the level of undergraduate and postgraduate level respectively.…”

Realfooders Influencers on Instagram: From Followers to Consumers

“…Social networks are considered spaces of social influence, by which actions, thoughts and even feelings are influenced by others connected in the network [ 1 ]. Among different types of influence, there is one called normative social influence, which is defined as the “need to please others” [ 2 ].…”