The Role of Digital Literacy in Mitigating the Effects of Social Media Usage on Academic Performance: A Study of TikTok Users in Higher Education Institutions in China

Digital literacy improvement is considered supportive to optimize the use of social media platforms in a positive way. The influence of platforms such as TikTok is considered significant for influencing the academic performance level of a student pursuing his/her higher education. However, lack of proper knowledge about digital literacy improvement is still affecting the academic performance of the users in China. Relevant questions and objectives are developed to reach the purpose of the research study. The integration of the “Uses and Gratification Theory” further helps in exploring the interrelationship between the variables selected in the study that is followed by formation of the hypotheses. A detailed analysis of existing literature has facilitated the identification of the gap that shows lack of research on potential effects of TikTok on academic outcomes. Primary data collection has been used in this study for conducting the survey process among 410 students from the institutions of China. The quantitative data analysis has been used for examining the collected information through IBM SPSS. The results highlight that all the variables selected for the research have a significant impact on the Academic Performance of the students in higher education institutions in China apart from frequency of usage. Its direct impact on Academic Performance has not been established by the findings from the analysis. The study helps in identifying the need for more extensive research or doing qualitative data based research for exploring more ideas about the factors associated with digital literacy improvement by practical strategies.