Social Media Usage and Its Academic Impact among Higher Secondary Students in Murshidabad District, West Bengal
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.63300/arjst0503062026.02Keywords:
Social Media, Higher Secondary School Students, Facebook, WhatsApp, Social Networking Sites, Academic Impact, MurshidabadAbstract
The present study investigates the use of social media among higher secondary school students in Murshidabad district, West Bengal. The study examined students’ awareness, usage patterns, communication preferences, and the academic impact of social media. Age-wise distribution survey method was adopted for the study, and data were collected through structured questionnaires distributed among students from eleven higher secondary schools. A total was questionnaires were distributed, and all were returned successfully.
The findings reveal that most students are familiar with and actively use social media platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter, YouTube, and other networking applications. Most students use social media primarily for communication, sharing information, entertainment, and educational purposes. The study also found that many students have average proficiency with social media tools, while a significant number learned to use these platforms through friends and peers. Although social media positively contributes to communication, academic collaboration, and access to educational resources, excessive use also creates distractions and social problems among students.
The study further indicates that parental awareness regarding students' social media activities remains limited. Many respondents admitted that they spend considerable time on social networking sites and often face challenges related to privacy, security, and academic distraction. Despite these concerns, more than half of the respondents believed that social media has a positive impact on their studies and social connectivity.
The research concludes that social media has become an essential part of students' daily lives and educational experiences. However, proper guidance, digital literacy, parental monitoring, and awareness programs are necessary to ensure the healthy and productive use of social media among higher secondary school students.
Downloads
References
[1]. Ahmed, S., Pokhrel, N., Roy, S., & Samuel, A. J. (2019). Impact of nomophobia: A non-drug addiction among physiotherapy students. Indian Journal of Psychiatry, 61(1), 77–80.
[2]. Aguilera-Manrique, G., Márquez-Hernández, V. V., Alcaraz-Córdoba, T., et al. (2018). Relationship between nomophobia and smartphone distraction among nursing students. PLOS ONE, 13(8).
[3]. Daei, A., Ashrafi-Rizi, H., & Soleymani, M. R. (2019). Smartphone addiction among university students. International Journal of Preventive Medicine, 10.
[4]. Gnanadhas, J., Venkatachalam, J., Menon, V., & Olickal, J. (2019). Nomophobia among college students in Pondicherry. Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine.
[5]. Kim, E.-L., Gentile, D. A., & Linder, J. R. (2025). Social media use and academic outcomes: The mediating role of grit. Social Psychology of Education, 28(4).
[6]. Lukose, J. M., & Agbeyangi, A. O. (2025). Social media and academic performance among university students. arXiv.
[7]. Muhamad, G. N. (2025). Impact of social media on learning focus and academic outcomes. Cemerlang Journal, 1(1).
[8]. Perez, E., Manca, S., Fernández-Pascual, R., & McGuckin, C. (2023). Social media as a teaching and learning tool. Education and Information Technologies, 28.
[9]. Rahaman, J., & Batcha, M. S. (2022). A scientometric assessment of the research performance of Indian universities. Shodh Samhita, 9(1), 192–205.
[10]. Rahaman, J., & Batcha, M. S. (2022). Scientometric analysis and collaboration trends of state universities from West Bengal. Journal of Social Sciences and Management, 1(2), 21–33.
[11]. Rahaman, J., & Batcha, M. S. (2022). Scientometric assessment of the research productivity of Calcutta University, West Bengal. Indian Journal of Natural Sciences, 13(73), 44881–44893.
[12]. Shareef, Z. (2025). Impact of social media on education and student engagement. The Social Science Review.
[13]. Shaikh, A., Ali, S., & Al-Maamari, R. (2022). Social media in learning and teaching: A bibliometric analysis.
[14]. Shankar, V., Singh, K., & Jangir, M. K. (2018). Detection and analysis of smartphone addiction in India.
[15]. Stewart, O. G. (2015). Social media affordances in classroom learning. E-Learning and Digital Media, 12(5–6).
[16]. Thapa, K., Lama, S., Pokharel, R., Sigdel, R., & Rimal, S. P. (2020). Mobile phone dependence among undergraduate students. Journal of Nepal Medical Association, 58(224).
[17]. Tyagi, V. (2025). Impact of social media on student learning behavior. International Journal of Innovative Social Science Research.
[18]. Yildirim, C., & Correia, A.-P. (2015). Development and validation of the Nomophobia Questionnaire. Computers in Human Behavior, 49, 130–137.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Articles published in the Academic Research Journal of Science and Technology (ARJST will be Open-Access articles distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0). This allows for immediate free access to the work and permits any user to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose.
This open-access article is distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0).
How to Cite
