Social Media Phenomenon among Undergraduate Students of Nnamdi Azikiwe University

Social Media Phenomenon among Undergraduate Students of Nnamdi Azikiwe University.

Introduction

Universities are facing class filled with digitally native students who are demanding a new kind of teaching. They have been brought up under the influence of audiovisuals and the web.

The new technological social Media networks such as Facebook, 2Go, twitter and Whatsapp, etc; has become a thing of constant usage by undergraduates of university students, this has given the students the power to share,

create, inform and communicate and have become an essential element in their lives through the use  of social media,

Therefore, Social media refers to all web-based applications and mobile communications technologies that allow users to design and exchange ideas, often in real-time.

1.1 Background of the Study

Over the last three decades, technology redefined social interaction. Internet connectivity demolished geographical barriers to communication.

At the same time, new devices and greater access to more advanced computers and mobile phones certainly accelerated the process of bringing the world together, no matter how disparate the cultures may be.

Some social media such as Facebook and 2Go etc has become a common phenomenon(constant)  way of communication among undergraduate, and this form of interaction is not even hindered by geographical location.

Users share a variety of information about themselves on their Facebook profiles, including photos, contact information, and tastes in movies and books.

They list their friends”, include friends at other schools. Users can also specify what courses they are taking and join a variety of groups” of

people with similar interests. The site is often used to obtain contact information, match names to faces, and to browse for entertainment.

Facebook which is one of the social media used today by many youths was founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerburg, then a Harvard undergraduate.

References

Lometti, G.E., Reeves, B. and Bybee, C.R. (1977), “Investigating the assumptions of uses and gratifications research”, Communications Review,  4: 321-38.

O’Donohoe, S. (1994), “Advertising uses and gratifications”, European Journal of Marketing, 28 (8): 52-75.

Palmgreen, P., Wenner, L.A. and Rayburn, J.D. (1981), “Gratification discrepancies and news programme choice”, Communications Research,  8:451-78.

Parker, B.J. and Plank, R.E. (2000), “A uses and gratifications perspective on the internet as a new information source”, American Business    Review, 18(2):43-50.

Payne, G.A., Severn, J.J. and Dozier, D.M. (1988), “Uses and gratifications motives as indicators of magazine readership”, Journalism Quarterly, 65(4):909-13.

Raacke, J. and Bonds-Raacke, J. (2008), “MySpace and Facebook: applying the uses and gratifications theory to exploring friend-networking sites”, CyberPsychology & Behaviour,  11(2): 169-74.