Impacts of Social Media on the Academic Performance of University Students in Pakistan

Social media is a rapidly growing online category where users generate, share, bookmark, and network content. Social media has been a double-edged sword in education, and the introduction of smartphones has made it easy for students to use different platforms with ease. Though there is an overwhelming amount of evidence that points towards the facilitation of academic engagement through social networking by allowing peer-to-peer collaboration and sharing of resources overuse is associated with reduced academic productivity and heightened levels of stress. This research investigates the extent of social media implications in an academic setting, with specific emphasis on university students in Balochistan, Pakistan. Based on a quantitative method of a surveyed sample of 400 university students including undergraduate (72.3%), master (22.5%), and PhD (5.2%) from four major higher education institutions in Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan. The collected data was analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) and Microsoft Excel. The results of the present research identify trends in social media usage, time devoted, reasons for engagement, perceived academic impacts, and degree of distraction. Although a large number of respondents have seen social media as useful for academic purposes, distractions and the predominance of recreational use indicate a complicated relationship.