Social Networking Sites Usage and Students' Attitudes Towards Social Behaviors and Academic Adjustment in Northern Nigerian Universities

The present study examines the extent to which social networking sites (SNSs) usage, students’ social behaviors (SSB) and students’ academic adjustment (SAA) among university students in Northern Nigeria. It investigated relationship among the SNS usage SSB, and SAA. The variance in the extent of SNSs usage in relation to gender, age, faculty, ethnicity, socioeconomic background and religion was also investigated. The moderating effect of attitude towards SNS usage was examined. Four hundred participants were sampled and they completed the questionnaires. In addition, 24 volunteered participants from six universities were interviewed at six level focus groups on the constructs related to SNSs usage SSB and SAA. This study employed a mixed-method model as interviews and questionnaires were employed. The data were qualitatively and quantitatively collected, sorted, analyzed and reported separately at significantly equal weight. The thematic qualitative analyses and the quantitative descriptive results suggested that the extent of SNSs usage, the SSB and SAA is high among the university students in northern Nigeria. One way analysis of variance (ANOVA) also revealed that there were no significant differences in the extent of SNSs usage in terms of age, faculty, socio economic background and the level of study. However, significant differences exist among ethnicity and religion. The independent sample t-tests revealed no gender differences in the extent of SNSs usage. Similarly the present findings show significantly positive inter-relationships among the SNSs usage, SSB and SAA. The findings also found attitude to be a strong predictor and moderator of the relationship between the SNSs and both the students’ social behaviors and students’ academic adjustment.