Influence of Social Media on Business Education Students’ Research Project Work in Universities in Enugu State of Nigeria

Abstract

The study was carried out to determine the influence of social media on Business Education students’ research project writing in Universities in Enugu State. The study was carried out in public and private universities in Enugu State using a descriptive survey research method. Two research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. The population for the study comprised 91 Business Education students in three universities offering Business Education in Enugu State during the 2017/2018 academic session. There was no sampling because the population was manageable. The instrument used for data collection was a 17 item structured questionnaire developed by the researcher. The instrument was structured using a four point rating scale and was face validated by three experts, two of them from Business Education Department and one in Measurement and Evaluation from Department of Science and Computer Education both in the Faculty of Education, Enugu State University of Sciences and Technology. Cronbach Alpha was used to determine the reliability of the instrument which gave a value of .84. The data analysis was based on responses from 87 copies of questionnaire out of 91 copies distributed which represent 95.60% return rate. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions and t-test was used to test the hypotheses at .05 level of significance at 94 degree of freedom. The result of the findings showed that communicating with supervisors on the progress of project writing, retrieving of information from friends in other schools, collection of data on the research topic through opinion poll, receiving and sending instrument from validators, sending to and receiving from respondents the questionnaire and its response., receiving appointment days from the supervisor, and giving and receiving research based instructions from the supervisor to the student are some of the positive influences of social media on Business Education students’ research work. The null hypotheses tested showed no significant difference in the mean rating of male and female Business Education students on the entire variables. Based on the findings, some implications were deduced and it was recommended among others that the Business Education students should utilize the power of social media in conducting quality empirical studies before they graduate for the propagation of knowledge and business Education students should avoid using social media for academically inglorious activities such as watching of pornographic contents or use of social media to harass, embarrass, impersonate and insult elderly scholars.

Keywords: social media, business education, research project, universities.

DOI: 10.7176/JEP/11-12-08

Publication date: April 30^th 2020