Effects of Social Media Usage on Academic Activities of Undergraduate Students of University of Africa, Toru-Orua, Bayelsa State, Nigeria

The study investigated effect of social media usage on academic activities of undergraduates’ students of University of Africa, Toru-Orua, Bayelsa State, Nigeria. The study adopted survey method. The population of the study comprises of all the students in University of Africa. Systematic sampling was used to select two hundred and seven four (274) respondents for the study. Five (5) research questions guided the study and data were collected using structured questionnaire. It was analyzed using descriptive statistics. The findings show that WhatsApp and Facebook are the two social media networks mostly used by students. It was revealed that the students spend lesser time (30 minutes to 1 hour) on social media per day and it was significantly used for academic purposes. On the effects of the use of social media on the academic activities of students, the findings reveals that social media had no negative effect on the academic activities of the students. Based on the findings of this study, the researchers concluded that social media usage does not affect the academic activities of the students. The study finally recommends that Libraries and University authorities should organize workshops to teach their students on how to exploit the educational advantages of inherent on social media sites and also create awareness on the effects of misuse of social media.