University Sociology Report: Social Media Impact on Youth

This report presents a sociological survey conducted to examine the negative impacts of social media on youth. The research, based on a literature review, formulated seven hypotheses regarding social media's effects on study habits, relationships, privacy, and other aspects of personal life. A survey using a snowball sampling technique was administered to a sample of 15 participants, collecting responses to a set of questions designed to validate or invalidate the initial hypotheses. The findings indicate that social media usage diverts attention from studies, devalues relationships, causes misuse of personal details, and contributes to marital infidelity, among other things. While some questions did not yield conclusive results, the overall survey validated the negative impacts of social media as outlined in previous research. The report concludes by discussing the validity of the findings and suggesting areas for future research, such as focusing on a specific aspect of social media's impact rather than a broad range of issues.

Running head: INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1INTERVIEW
Introduction
The social media, especially the forums such as facebook and instagram whereby the
users post events from their daily lives and that is how people seek the personal touch in their
lives which has been almost lost due to the social and economic pressure and compulsions of the
modern world. Thus the emotional touch of the life is being sought by virtual means, that is
through social media forums like facebook and instagram as the busy modern life has made it
possible for human beings to keep in touch with their loved ones on a frequent basis. This shows
that the social media sites are beneficial as it helps human beings to make up for the loss of
personal life due to the bureaucratic commitments necessitated by the economic and social
pressure of the modern world (Anderson and Jiang).
On the flip side there are several disadvantages associated with the over usage of the
social media sites and they affect the youth especially. In this particular survey research seven
key issues which affect the personal lives of the youth negatively due to the use of social media
shall be researched upon. The currently researches tend to opine that :-
- Social Media diverts attention from studies (Lau)
- Social Media has devalued relationships (Anderson and Jiang)
- Social Media provides an illusory view of life (Lau)
- Social Media causes misuse of personal details (Anderson and Jiang)
- Social Media creates loneliness (Anderson and Jiang)
- Social Media has made sex easily available (Anderson and Jiang)
- Social Media has led to increased marital infidelity (Anderson and Jiang)

2INTERVIEW
Through this particular survey research the aim is to prove the validity of the
abovementioned 7 hypotheses, which are the research questions sourced from the reading of the
available literature on the negative effects of social media on youth.
Methodology
Three kinds of methodology has been followed for this particular research,
- The qualitative method of literature review to gather the hypotheses and the research
questions. On the basis of reading the literature the seven research questions had been
sourced which was used to guide the research.
- The survey method following the snowball sampling technique for collecting the
responses based on the research questions. A sample consisting of 15 persons, 7 men
and 8 women were sent a set of 10 questions each by online means from within my
university and they were supposed to be answered by means of ticking the Agree,
Disagree or No opinion option for each of the seven research questions.
- The deductive approach of Karl Popper has been used to analyze the data collected by
the survey and thereby either validate or invalidate the hypotheses sourced from
literature review of the existing works of the research scholars. The data analysis
involved the relation between the results of the literature review and the survey
research.

3INTERVIEW
Findings
In the table below the results of the survey has been plotted and the responses have been
calculated in percentage in order to ensure that the hypotheses and the research questions could
be either validated or invalidated.
- With regard to the question that Social Media diverts attention from studies, there has
been a 100% agreement as per the responses collected which validates the research
conducted by previous scholars.
- With regard to the question that Social Media has devalued relationships, 60% of the
sample has agreed which validates the research conducted by previous scholars.
- With regard to the question that Social Media provides an illusory view of life 60% of
the sample has not shared any opinion hence it is has not been possible to either
validate or invalidate the existing researches.
- With regard to the question that Social Media causes misuse of personal details
73.33% of the sample has agreed which validates the research conducted by previous
scholars.
- With regard to the question that Social Media creates loneliness 53.33% of the
sample has not shared any opinion hence it is has not been possible to either validate
or invalidate the existing researches.
- With regard to the question that Social Media has made sex easily available 66.66%
of the sample has agreed which validates the research conducted by previous
scholars.

4INTERVIEW
- With regard to the question that Social Media has led to increased marital infidelity
66.66% of the sample has agreed which validates the research conducted by previous
scholars.

5INTERVIEW
Sample Questions
Sex Ag
e
Ethnicity 1-Social
Media
diverts
attention
from
studies
2- Social
Media has
devalued
relationships
3- Social
Media
provides
an
illusory
view of
life
4- Social
Media
causes
misuse of
personal
details
5- Social
Media
creates
loneliness
6- Social
Media
has made
sex easily
available
7- Social
Media
has led to
increased
marital
infidelity
1 M 20 Hispanic Agree Agree No
opinion
Agree No
opinion
No
opinion
Agree
2 M 22 Irish Agree Disagree Disagree Agree Agree Disagree No
opinion
3 M 29 Arab Agree Agree No
opinion
Disagree No
opinion
Agree Agree
4 M 28 American Agree No opinion No
opinion
Agree No
opinion
No
opinion
Disagree
5 M 27 Armenian Agree Disagree No
opinion
Agree No
opinion
Agree Disagree
6 M 21 Iranian Agree Agree Disagree Agree Disagree Agree Agree
7 M 26 Irish Agree Disagree No
opinion
Disagree No
opinion
No
opinion
No
opinion
8 F 25 French Agree Agree Agree Agree Disagree Agree Agree
9 F 22 American Agree No opinion No
opinion
Disagree No
opinion
Agree Agree
10 F 24 American Agree Agree Agree Agree Agree Agree Agree
11 F 21 Hispanic Agree Agree No
opinion
Agree No
opinion
Agree No
opinion
12 F 29 Spanish Agree No opinion Agree Agree Agree Agree Agree
13 F 22 German Agree Agree No
opinion
Disagree Agree No
opinion
Agree
14 F 20 Arab Agree Agree Disagree Agree Agree Agree Agree
15 F 21 African Agree Agree No
opinion
Agree No
opinion
Agree Agree
Percentage Agree-
100%
Disagree-
0%
No
opinion-
0%
Agree- 60%
Disagree-
20%
No opinion-
20%
Agree-
20%
Disagree-
20%
No
opinion-
60%
Agree-
73.33%
Disagree
- 26.66%
No
opinion-
0%
Agree-
33.33%
Disagree-
13.33%
No
opinion-
53.33%
Agree-
66.66%
Disagree-
6.66%
No
opinion-
26.66%
Agree-
66.66%
Disagree-
13.33%
No
opinion-
20%
Conclusion
With regard to the questions that Social Media diverts attention from studies, Social
Media has devalued relationships, Social Media causes misuse of personal details, Social Media
has made sex easily available and Social Media has led to increased marital infidelity, the survey

6INTERVIEW
results tend to validate the researches conducted by the previous scholars. While with regard to
the questions Social Media creates loneliness and Social Media provides an illusory view of life
no definite conclusion has been reached. However since majority of the research questions have
been validated, the existing researches can also be considered as valid.
Evaluation
The only aspect that I would like to change about the research is that I would like to
narrow down on one aspect of the negative effect on personal life, it could be either studies, sex
life or personal relationships instead of conducting a survey on variety of issue pertaining to
different tangents of life.

7INTERVIEW
References
Anderson, Monica, and Jingjing Jiang. "Teens, social media & technology 2018." Pew Research
Center 31 (2018): 2018.
Lau, Wilfred WF. "Effects of social media usage and social media multitasking on the academic
performance of university students." Computers in human behavior 68 (2017): 286-291.