The Use of Social Media Platforms for Academic Purposes

A Case Study of Federal University of Technology, Minna, Niger State

Abstract

This study examined students perceptions of how social media can be used to
support teaching and learning in Nigerian Universities using Federal University
of Technology, Minna as a case study. Three research questions and three null
hypotheses guided the study. The population was made up of 550 final year
students of the School of Science and Technology Education out of which a total
of 155 students were randomly selected for the study. The study was a qualitative
research which involved the use of questionnaire as instrument for data
collection. The instrument was validated by three experts in Information and
Communication Technology. The reliability coefficient index computed for the
instrument was 0.81using Cronbach Alpha formula. The data were analysed
using mean and Spearman Correlation Coefficient. The findings revealed among
others that students are aware of social media tools that can be used to perform
academic tasks such as Images and photographs, document creation and
presentations; while students also classified Communication, Videos and instant
messaging as the most familiar, frequent and important academic activities
carried out on social media platform. Furthermore, the results showed no
significant correlation between gender and awareness; gender and frequency;
gender and importance. Awareness was highly correlated to the frequency and
moderately correlated to the importance. Frequency was highly correlated to the
importance. Consequently, it was recommended among others that since
awareness of social media platforms roughly translated into actual usage, more
enlightenment campaign should be carried out by the university Community to
encourage students on the use of these social media platforms.