Dataset Information

Impact of social media on the academic performance of undergraduate medical students.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Social media has become an integral part in the life of every individual in the 21st century. Social media addiction in the younger age group is a major problem. The objective of this study was to find a correlation between academic performance and social media use.

Methods

This was a cross-sectional questionnaire-based study conducted in a medical school over a period of 3 months (Nov 2018-Jan 2019), where 400 medical undergraduates who use social media participated in the study. Data collected from the questionnaire included the academic performance in terms of university examination marks, the duration of social media use per day and the social media addiction score. Data correlation was done using the Pearson's correlation factor.

Results

41.5% of students used social media for upto 3 h per day. Whatsapp (98.25%) and Youtube (91.75%) were the most commonly used social media applications. 73.5% used social media to read health-related news, 71.5% used it to complete assignments and more than 50% used it for seminar preparation, test preparation and research-related purposes. Academic performance of female students was better than male students. There was a significantly higher use of social media among academically low-performing medical students compared with high-performing medical students. There was a weak negative correlation between academic performance and social media usage and a strong positive correlation between social media usage and the social media addiction score.

Conclusions

Social media has a negative impact on the academic performance of 21st-century undergraduate medical students.

SUBMITTER: Bhandarkar AM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7873710 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:BackgroundThe current study aimed to evaluate the previously unexplored correlation between undergraduate medical students' attendance during their surgical clerkship and their academic performance. It also aimed to explore any difference in the attendance rate between male and female students and whether this difference, if present, affects the academic performance.MethodsA retrospective descriptive cross-sectional study has been conducted on 331 undergraduate medical students during their surgical clerkships at the College of Medicine and Medical Sciences (CMMS) at Arabian Gulf University (AGU), Bahrain from September 2018 to June 2020.ResultsThere was a positive statistically significant correlation between students' attendance during surgical clerkship and academic performance (r = 0.360, P < 0.01). Mean attendance rate was greater in each increasing category of academic performance: 47.95% in the weak category (less than 65%, n = 42), 57.62% in the good performance category (65% to less than 75%, n = 108), 67.82% in the very good performance category (75% to less than 85%, n = 126), 83.16% in the excellent performance category (85% and above, n = 55). The mean attendance rate of male students was 59.76% (SD = 25.73), compared to 66.92% (SD = 24.30) in the female students. T-test indicated that the difference between the mean attendance of the two groups of the students (male, female) was statistically significant (t = 2.483, p < 0.05). On the other hand, the difference between the mean academic performance for the two groups of students, male & female, (t = 0.284, p = 0.777) was not statistically significant.ConclusionsOur study showed a significant relationship between undergraduate medical students' attendance during their surgical clerkship and their academic performance. Further studies are needed to stratify this correlation according to clinical and theoretical teaching activities. No significant difference was observed in academic performance between female and male students.