Social Media at CV
Veronica Slevin
Staff Writer
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Social media is part of almost everyone’s daily lives now. The first thing many people do upon waking up is go onto a social media website, and many times, that same platform is the last thing they see before they fall asleep.
Students tend to spend much more time on electronics than their parents did, because it is much more accessible. However, many adults are condescending about the amount of time teens spend online and how that makes students less productive. Are the students truly ruining their productivity through their social media usage?
Fifty Cumberland Valley High School students took a short survey about their personal social media usage and what they thought of it. The survey consisted of 24 seniors, 8 juniors, 12 sophomores and 6 freshman.
The average amount of time spent on social media per day by surveyed students is 3.76 hours. As the graph below shows, most students choose between 1 and 5 hours per day. Only 3 students said 8 or more hours, and one person said they are on social media barely at all.
Figure 1
This question was followed up with gaining information with what social media platform was the most common among the students. Sixteen students said they spent the most time on Snapchat, 19 responded with Instagram, 7 said TikTok, and 9 said Youtube.
Surprisingly, only 70% of students said they felt distracted by social media, even though students usually spend hours on these websites.
Also, only 34% of students responded ‘yes’ when asked if they thought their grades would improve if they spent less time online. Eleven students said their grades would not improve if they reduced their screen time. The other 22 students responded with ‘maybe’, meaning they don’t know if social media affects their grades. (see figure 2). Most of the students that responded with ‘yes’ spend 4 hours on social media.
Many people who responded ‘no’ were students who spent 2 or less than 3 hours online. People who responded with ‘maybe’ spend various amounts of time on social media, showing that they do not think they spend too much time online, or that these students think their grades are the top of their potential despite social media usage.
Figure 2
Only 7 students said that they would not spend less time on social media to increase productivity. The other 44 said that they would consider it.
People who spend lots of time on social media could benefit from cutting down on screen time. Students could get done with their schoolwork earlier in the night if they are not as distracted and get more sleep. Also, not being on social media when studying allows for fewer distractions and higher grades.