Mobile Phones as Distracting Tools In The Classroom: College Students Perspective

There are more than six billion users of cell phones worldwide. The need for people to connect with others frequently is apparent in our society. People use mobile phones everywhere and every time, to call and text friends, surf the web, visit social sites and attach themselves to their communication devices at all times. As the use of mobile phones has proliferated in academic settings in recent years, new challenges are faced by institutions of higher education and their faculties. Research indicates that increasing use of mobile phones by the students in the classroom causes a big distraction, although all of the college students have their own mobile phones and all of them regularly bring their devices to courses.The prevalence and inconvenient usage of mobile phones in colleges has prompted college administrators to create policies to manage mobile phone use during the school day. Also there is a lot of support for mobile phones to be banned from colleges, but such rules are not accepted or enforced in universities. Actually, college students must have the ability to consider the advantages and disadvantages of their behaviors. This study enlightens the situation about use and abuse of cell phones during courses. This paper presents the result of a study conducted on 300 college students from faculty of business administration at Sakarya University to gain a better understanding of the frequency and manner of cell phone use in college classrooms. Focusing on the use of text messaging during courses, students reported on their own and others’ use of cell phones. The current research reveals that minority of the students use their smartphones during class time to enhance learning, such as using their smartphones as computers to look up relevant information pertaining to the lesson, as cameras to take pictures of information on the blackboard or screen, as calculators, and so forth. However, majority of the students use their smartphones during class time for personal use not related to learning. One of the most striking result of this study shows that majority of the students distract their classmates and they will continue to behave this way, unless the administrators take precautions.