Examination of the attitudes of middle school students towards social media

Abstract

This study aims to identify middle school students` general attitudes towards social media. Participants of this descriptive study were middle school students from three public schools (n=367) in Ankara. Data was collected using “Demographic Information Form†and “Social Media Attitudes Survey for Students†developed by Ferhat Suleyman Argin in 2013. Data was analyzed using ANOVA, t test, Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskall Wallis-H test, frequency (f) and percentage (%). In this study, demographic information such as students’ gender, school type, grade level, perceived income levels, mother’s education level, and father’s education level; and social media use information such as membership to social media services, duration of social media use, frequency of social media use, time spent on social media at each use, medium that they use social media, tools to access social media and most used social media were collected. Students’ scores for Social Media Attitudes Survey were compared between groups based on this demographic and social media use variables. There were not a significant difference of Social Media Attitudes scores between the groups based on gender, schools, grade levels, perceived income levels, mother’s education level, father’s education level, membership to social media services, medium that they use social media, and tools to access social media variables. There were a significant difference of Social Media Attitudes scores between the groups based on frequency of social media use, and time spent on social media at each use variables. Since most used social media services variable was not distributed homogeneously, it couldn’t be compared. Based on the students overall Social Media Attitudes scores averages and score distribution and standard deviations it could be claimed that students’ general attitude toward social media was positive and high.

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