The Importance of Limitation by Using Facebook

to those Students of Grade 12-Gas Night

of System Plus Computer College

Chapter II: Review Related Literature

Facebook addiction is characterized by the passing an inordinate amount of time on

Facebook. Usually, it depends on a person’s Facebook user impeding with momentous
functions in life like job, school or keeping close interactions with family and true friends
[1]. Addiction is a very dominant term and it is palpable that somebody can have a snag
with Facebook deprived of absolute addiction. Sometimes this genre of addictive
behavior is called as Facebook addiction disorder (FAD), even though it is being studied
by psychologists, but the symptoms are not extensively recognized as
a psychological disorder [2].

Approximately daily 900 million people use Facebook [3]. The cardinal drive is to keep
in touch with intimate friends and other intimates. Some researchers connect social
network sites (SNSs) addiction with health-allied, professional, educational,
interpersonal glitches and so on. People who use SNSs extremely may have abated in
real life social communication and academic feat, in consort with relationship snags.

Current statistics demonstrate that every day about 63% of American Facebook users
log on to the site, whereas 40% of users log on many times a day [4]. Generally, people
use SNSs for their individual motives. A few people like to surf at other people’s status
updates and pictures, although others use the sites as an approach to express their
fervor. In fact, one of the foremost bases, we use SNSs is for self-interruption and
monotony remission. The users who post pictures/status gets reinforcement by
receiving amiable emoji (i.e. like, love, haha, wow) and comments on there’s posts. It is
proved that behaviors that are incessantly reinforced will be recurring, but it will be
travailed for such people who have settled this matter to merely stop and becomes
addicted (Figure 1). The aforesaid behaviors serve as an ancestor for Facebook
addiction. Actually, these types of behaviors are so regular that Andreassen et al.
invented a psychological scale to determine Facebook addiction called Berge Facebook
Addiction Scale (BFAS) [5]. To measure Facebook addiction this scale has 6
benchmarks. These comprise avowals, such as “you spend a lot of time thinking about
Facebook and planning how to use it” and “you use Facebook to forget about personal
problems.” The researchers of BFAS express that getting “often” or “very often” amid 4
of the 6 benchmarks directs Facebook addiction [5].

The most alluring is that people who are more apprehensive, bemuse and doubtful are
more feasible to use the SNS. Meshi et al. presumed a connection between the
approach the brain processes, particularly self-related feats in magnitude and one’s
depth of Facebook sake [6]. The researchers verified that amid participants when
reacting to the coup in fame for the self, acquaintance to success for others, reward-
linked demeanors in the left nucleus accumbens conjecture Facebook use. Regardless,
nucleus accumbens act compared to monetary reward did not forecast Facebook use.
This study broadens our existing knowledge of the nucleus accumbens role as it relays
to human behavior [7-9]. To sum up, the consequences illustrate how self-feeling of the
nucleus accumbens to the acceptance of self-pertinent societal info contributes to
disparities in real-world behavior. From these findings, it seems that the majorities of
people who are addicted to Facebook use the site as a mode of acquiring attention and
boost up their self-admiration. But these activities have copious deleterious effects
on mental health and welfare including addiction.

The Anxiety UK conducted numerous studies to detect the linkage of technology (i.e.,
computers, mobile phones, smartphones and SNSs) and anxiety [10]. The denominate
suggested destructively alteration of behavior for more than half of respondents who
frequently usage SNSs. The study also reported many causes for example, adversely
matching themselves to online friends, massive spend of time in online, worry for
detaching and relax from online and argumentative virtual accessible as risk factors to
generate difficulties in their relationships or jobs [10]. Moreover, angst or malaise was
reported for 45 percent of respondents who were not able to entree their SNSs or E-
mail [10]. Shockingly to get a break, 60 percent of respondents alleged that they felt the
necessity to turn off their technology [10]. Additionally, 1 in 3 of them proverb they
switched off numerous times a day [10].

Rauch et al. examine the connection between face-to-face situation and Facebook, to
reveal that disclosure to SNSs boost or attenuate physiological arousal among the
socially anxious participants [11]. The researchers described that Facebook was
responsible to augment arousal prior to a face-to-face meeting, predominantly for
participants with high levels of anxiety [11].

In accordance with the study of Kross et al. using Facebook may even make us rueful
[12]. The denouements specify that Facebook uses forecasts undesirable vicissitudes
on both of happiness (i.e., how people perceive time-to-time and how mollified they are
with their lives) over time [12]. Many people used Facebook during one time period, felt
a degraded condition, the next time text-messaged them; consequently their life
contentment levels abated over time if they used Facebook over 2 weeks. In fact, direct
interaction with other people did not speculate these deleterious outcomes.

In a study of the Salford Business School at the University of Salford disclosed that
SNSs, for example Facebook and Twitter forge anxiety [13]. Likewise, as per the
Telegraph article, the researchers reported that, amid 298 participants more than half of
those interviewed claimed their behavior had reformed by using such sites and half of
those alleged their lives had been transformed to inferior [13]. The mainstream of
people sued their confidence level attenuated owing to relating their feats with virtual
friends. Furthermore, two-thirds had quibble of appeasing or asleep glitches after being
available for some time in SNSs. This study also absolutely presented that the Internet
is addictive. Over half of people ascribed anxious or sore without access to their
Facebook, Twitter or else E-mail accounts. Furthermore, Uddin et al. reported that
Internet addiction disorder is linked to psychological distress and depression [14].

Ryan et al. in an appraisal reported that the most prevalent drives for Facebook use are
relationship preservation, passing time, enjoyment and comradeship [15]. These
incentives may be linked to Facebook addiction through use that is habitual, extreme, or
influenced by a desire for mood change. Inspection of Facebook addiction study shows
that Facebook use can convert usual or extreme and few addicts use the site to free
from adverse moods [15]. Teenagers connected in SNSs are more disposed to smoke,
drink and drug addiction. Researchers of the National Centre on Addiction and
Substance Abuse detected teenagers outlay any time on SNSs every day were 5 times
prone to smoke compared to non-visitors [16]. Furthermore, they were 3 times more
prone to drink alcohol and had twofold fortuitous of smoking cannabis [16]. The study
also noticed that peer burden was exerting a foremost part, for 40 percent of the
teenagers seeing pictures of friends getting boozer on sites alike Facebook and
MySpace [16].

Nowadays Facebook has turned out to be an imperious part of our life. This is a
disquieting fact for teenagers that need to be addressed swiftly. In fact, it is not purely
that the uses of SNSs especially Facebook is getting beyond control, but we
indispensable to be virtually linked always. The parents should be cognizant that their
teenagers are breathing at a time in which they are relentless ‘on’ and linked. For
teenagers who are gradually addicted to the SNSs like Facebook or presently addicted,
there is prerequisite to screen them for apposite counseling for the betterment of the
world.

The internet in itself is not addictive; instead, the social functions, self- expression,
communication, and building of personal ties on the internet are what is addictive (Li &
Chung, 2006). Some of these identified motives people engage in on social media have
been described as potentially addictive and may therefore lead to social media addiction
(Nyland, 2007). Nyland identified the five motives of using social media as “meeting new
people, entertainment, maintaining relationships, social events and media creation
(Nyland, 2007). A study by Hinson revealed that postgraduate students of the University
of Ghana’s social use of the Internet include “sending and receiving email, socializing
through social media (mostly Facebook), chatting, and making new friends (Hinson,
2011).

Students use social media for “connecting with old friends and family members, finding
new friends, obtaining or sharing learning materials, receiving update of events,

posting information and whiling away time (Young,2010).”

However, majority of these studies focus on the true aspects of addiction in relation to
psychology with introductory ones mainly assessing whether internet addiction actually
exists (Nauert,2010)

Their study was built on work done by (Young, 2010) on Internet addiction, but with
an important difference i.e. they were interested in the identifying consumers of
Facebook who were obsessed with its usage and also to explore the impact this
obsession has on the way they behave on Facebook rather than the diagnosis of
addiction in a clinical context. It enables people to stay in touch and connect with people
with similar interests and ideas. Social media may have an adverse effect on human
behavior because of gratifications derived from its use and studies in other parts of the
world have shown that it is potentially addictive (Otu, 2015) The addict people may start
going out less or spending less time out with friends due to the time they spend on
Facebook. While they are in front of the computer, they may remain unresponsive to the
things around them (Soron, 2015).

“Facebook addiction” is a term coined by researchers that is applied to individuals who

engage in excessive, compulsive Facebook use for the purposes of mood alteration,
with negative personal outcomes (5). In other words, a person with Facebook addiction
may subjectively experience a loss of control while continuing to use Facebook
excessively despite its detrimental effects on the individual’s life (6). However,
excessive use may not be considered addictive unless it is compulsive; for example,
one may spend long hours on Facebook for the purposes of work without being
addicted (5). Because Facebook is currently the most popular social networking site,
and empirical studies of Facebook use outweigh studies of other social networking sites
(7), the present review focuses on the emerging problem of Facebook addiction.

Facebook allows users to create profiles and form connections with other users called
“friends.” Friends may interact with each other by messaging and sharing photos,
videos, or personal interests while traversing information about the activities of their
friends and their friend’s friends. Users can enhance their profiles with a multitude of
apps; for instance, users can play games, gamble, and generate polls, as well as
integrate other social networking sites such as Twitter and Instagram. Facebook can
also be used by professionals to market their services and connect with their audiences.
Users are constantly notified of new online activity by a live news feed, which could
encourage addiction by acting as classically conditioned cues on a variable interval
reinforcement schedule (8).

As Facebook addiction is an emerging focus of study, current screening instruments

have been designed based on measures of other behavioral addictions (5). Most of
these scales are rooted in the six core components of addiction (9). For instance, the
Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale is based on six items measured on a Likert scale,
with each item reflecting a symptom of addictive behavior: 1) salience (“You spend a lot
of time thinking about Facebook or planning how to use it”); 2) tolerance (“You feel an
urge to use Facebook more and more”); 3) mood modification (“You use Facebook in
order to forget about personal problems”); 4) relapse (“You have tried to cut down on
the use of Facebook without success”); 5) withdrawal (“You become restless or troubled
if you are prohibited from using Facebook”); and 6) conflict (“You use Facebook so
much that it has had a negative impact on your job/studies”) (10). Although these scales
have been independently psychometrically validated, factor analysis reveals
inconsistencies in measurements, indicating lack of construct validity (5). This lack of
consensus regarding the conceptualization and diagnosis of Facebook addiction is the
main point of contention in this developing area of research.

Addiction is associated with an imbalance between activity in two key brain systems: the
impulsive amygdala-striatal system and the reflective inhibitory prefrontal brain system.
In substance addiction, the amygdala-striatal system is hyperactive, resulting in
intensified impulses for addictive behavior, whereas the prefrontal cortex is hypoactive,
resulting in an inability to stop impulsive behaviors after they have been triggered (11).
Turel et al. (12) examined the involvement of these neural systems in Facebook
addiction. Participants first completed a Facebook addiction questionnaire. Then, using
a go/no-go paradigm with functional MRI, the researchers examined how these brain
systems responded differently between Facebook signs and traffic signs and correlated
addiction scores with brain activity. They found that both substance addiction and
Facebook addiction were associated with hyperactivity in the amygdala-striatal system.
However, Facebook addiction was not associated with alterations in prefrontal cortex
activity, suggesting that individuals with Facebook addiction may have the capacity to
stop their impulsive behavior (12). This pattern of hyperactive impulsivity and
unchanged impulse inhibition is similar to that observed in Internet gaming addiction
(13). Although this study is limited by its cross-sectional design, these findings suggest
that Internet-based addictions and substance addiction have differing underlying
pathophysiology.

Facebook addiction is most commonly studied in college students and tends to have a
female preponderance. Certain personality traits such as extraversion, narcissism, high
levels of neuroticism, and lower levels of self-esteem correlate highly with compulsive
Facebook use (10, 14). According to Caplan’s social skill model, lonely, depressed
individuals who develop preference for online means of interaction are prone to
problematic Internet use (15). In line with this, researchers found a relationship between
anxiety and depression and compulsive Facebook use (16), suggesting that individuals
with poor psychosocial health may use Facebook as an escape from daily life.
Moreover, Muench et al. (17) suggested that social insecurities, such as social
comparison (“I feel that others have better lives than I do”), fear of missing out (“I feel I
am missing out on enjoyable social interactions more than others”), and fear of negative
social evaluation (“I worry about what other people think of me”), are associated with
dysfunctional Facebook use. However, there is no association between Facebook
addiction items and the existence of positive offline social relationships, suggesting that
Facebook addiction is driven primarily by social insecurity rather than a lack of positive
social relationships (17).

Currently, there are no specific treatment approaches for Facebook addiction, and
therefore researchers suggest using strategies used to treat Internet addiction (6).
Psychotherapeutic approaches include cognitive-behavioral therapy and multilevel
counseling. In the former, clients are taught to cognitively restructure certain negative
beliefs and catastrophic thinking, such as “everyone has better lives than I do.” In the
latter, clients are led through the stages of change using motivational interviewing while
involving family and peers. Pharmacologic agents are generally chosen based on
existing comorbidities, such as depression (6). Facebook addiction means spending an
excessive amount of time on Facebook. Typically, it involves a person's Facebook use
interfering with important activities in life, such as work, school or maintaining
relationships with family and "real" friends.

Addiction is a strong word, and someone can have a problem with Facebook without
having a full-blown addiction. Some call this emerging type of addictive behavior
"Facebook addiction disorder" or FAD, but the syndrome is not widely acknowledged as
a psychological disorder, though it is being studied by psychologists.

Many people jokingly say they are “addicted” to Facebook, but what does this really
mean? Facebook is more than just a social media phenomenon. In fact, according to
the results of the “Facebook Addiction” project by the University of Bergen in Norway,
“Facebook dependency produces symptoms similar to those seen in alcohol and
substance addictions.” In an additional study, researchers at the University of Chicago
discovered that Facebook could in fact be more addicting. Although urges to sleep
or have sex are much stronger, the urge to use Facebook is one desire that people are
more likely to give in to despite that it might negatively affect important aspects of their
life, such as their health, social life, and studies.

Overall, Facebook addiction can be a serious problem. In fact, Facebook recently

admitted on its official page that too much Facebook probably isn’t healthy: “Birthday
cakes are made for people to be together. They give friends a place to gather and
celebrate. But too much cake probably isn’t healthy. So, birthday cake is a lot like
Facebook.” Despite it being an odd status update by the massive social media
company, it certainly shows that Facebook’s negative qualities have hit home. If you
know someone who may be getting sucked a bit too far into social media, remind them
that enjoying Facebook is like enjoying birthday cake—moderation is key to their health.

This study demonstrated the widespread use of facebook among 98.2 % of the health
science students in a medical college of Nepal. This was found to be similar in
comparison, to studies conducted in different countries [12–14] on the same subject. In
addition to ease of connecting with friends or family, facebook’s news updates in a
variety of different categories (sports, politics, education, health etc.) encourages its
users to spend even more of their leisure time on the site. The increasing availability of
Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity), portable devices, and the popularity of facebook itself, might
have also contributed to facebook use among this population. According to Hew KF [2],
facebook has very little educational value and the participants mainly used facebook to
keep in contact with the known individuals which were found to be concurring with this
study. Moreover, this study also demonstrated that only 5 % of participants used
facebook for academic purpose, while other studies conducted by Raacke et al. [15]
and Gray et al. [13] reported academic use to be higher (10.9 and 25.5 % respectively).
This difference could be due to academic culture and varied institutional policies on the
use of internet in these institutions. While one-fourth of users in this study were found to
be accessing facebook during leisure time, when accessed regularly, there is potential
risk for developing addictive behaviours, through the development of poor self-discipline
and task avoidance [16].

A majority of the students accessed facebook on daily basis, in higher numbers than
similar past studies [13, 17]. Most of the students spent time on facebook on average,
less than 1–2 h daily, which was consistent with the findings reported by others [18, 19].
A majority of participants in this study admitted that they were on facebook until late at
night (61.5 %). A similar finding was obtained by Farooqi et al. among the students of
Dow University in Pakistan [20]. Young KS found that the university students’ sleep
patterns were disrupted due to facebook use late at night, leading to fatigue and
impaired academic performance [21]. This study also supported the findings of previous
studies [6, 17] that the majority of students accessed facebook using mobile devices.
This particular method of accessing facebook could be due to increased availability of
internet access and newer versions of operating systems on mobile devices that
support facebook use.

Similar to the previous studies [2, 6, 22], a small number of students reported that
relevant academic information was accessible through the facebook. The majority of the
participants felt that they could acquire academic assistance from other facebook users
to some degree, which was higher than a previous study conducted by Gafni and Deri
[6]. Facebook allows for rapid, easy access, and immediate interaction among students
and their teachers. This use of facebook can facilitate rapid consultation and
dissemination of lecture notes, prior exam information, and other information, much
more quickly than using traditional methods of learning. As a result, facebook has been
found to be effective in obtaining information quickly from others, saving time, and
money [6]. However, Hew [2] reviewed that only a minimal number of facebook users
actually asked for assistance from facebook friends, while most of the students
preferred discussing their personal life over their studies. Therefore, spending time on
facebook may significantly compromise a student’s academic success. In this study,
67.5 % of the users admitted that facebook negatively affected their studies, which was
higher than the finding of a previous study by Farooqi et al. [20].

The data from previous studies clearly indicated that the excessive use of social media,
compromises actual live social interaction and academic accomplishments. It may also
be associated with relationship problems, personal loneliness, and depression [23, 24].
We found that very small population (8.6 %) spent more time on facebook than live
interactions with others, unlike the result obtained by the previous study [20]. However,
17.4 % of participants indicated that facebook was a source of inspiration and
motivation for them. This is consistent with the findings of Farooqi et al. who observed
that many students admitted that excessive facebook use had ruined their social life,
causing them to spend less time with their loved ones [20]. Moreover, the researchers
at the University of Southern California reported that an increasing number of people,
admitted to spending less time with their family members as result of excessive use of
the internet, including social networking sites [25].

Young people have an increased tendency to develop additive behaviour with facebook
use. However, they are usually unaware of this additive behaviour [20]. In this study,
one-fourth of the users found it difficult to spend an entire day without accessing
facebook. Half of them complained of feeling irritated when they were disturbed while
using facebook, which was consistent with the findings of previous studies [17, 20].
More than half of the participants received complaints from their family or friends about
the amount of time they spent on facebook. As these are some of the key components
in determining the facebook addiction according to ‘Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale
(BFAS)’ [26], this supports the theory that these participants possibly have some degree
of facebook addiction. Sharifah et al. identified the negative behavioural consequences
of social networking as: hyperactivity, attention deficit, depression, and multi-tasking
mania [27]. Thus, proper education regarding the use of social media is needed.

As with any other technology facebook is not unique for eliciting both positive and
negative effects on its users. Previous studies have shown adverse effects similar to
computer use, such as: headache, backache, weight change, and eye problems
[17, 28]. Of those reported by the users in this study, burning eyes, disturbed sleep, and
headache were the most common reported adverse health effects. On the other hand,
23.2 % of participants denied experiencing any adverse effects. Sierra et al. stated that
both quantity and quality of sleep might strongly influence mood [29] and subjective
well-being, which in turn could impact the academic performance [21, 30] of the
students who use facebook late at night and do not allow for sufficient sleep. Al-Dubai et
al. had clearly indicated a significant association between facebook use, its adverse
health effects, and unhealthy behavior. They have recommended that higher
educational institutions should create awareness and safer practices for their students.
Additionally, they have advocated regular health screening of students to avoid the
possible health consequences due to facebook use [31].

Although a majority of students (71.5 %) claimed that they tried to reduce their time
spent on facebook, one-fourth of them were not successful indicating additive behavior,
consistent with the result found by Farooqi et al. [20]. It is worth mentioning that the
students were willing to invest more of their time on their studies rather than on
facebook. Further studies in a large population may reveal the factors associated with
positive and negative impacts of facebook use among the health science students.

Since information technology is rapidly evolving, popular social networks like facebook,
could be used by the educational institutions for academic purposes, such as uploading
data and sharing educational materials. It is likely that more students will use social
sites like facebook in future, as more attractive features are offered to their users. This
will undoubtedly affect the students’ learning process and have an impact on their
health and personal life. Therefore, new approaches and tools need to be developed for
evaluating the facebook use and its consequences among students.

Internet abuse is not a new concept when looking at the effects of CMC. Studies looking
at the effects of over use or self-reported abuse show a population who feel out of
control, helpless, with symptoms similar to people suffering from substance abuse or as
gambling addicts (Morahan-Martin, 2005). This is because the Internet is a unique
medium that allows different behaviors, be they normal, pathological, or disturbing that
might otherwise never be exhibited in normal society. Specifically, the “over-use and
dependency of the Internet has been reported to result in impairments that include work
and school-related problems and dismissals, interpersonal problems, separations and
divorces, and even impaired health” (p. 40). Most of these types of disorders could be
considered impulse control behavior problems, where the Facebook 21 person is
unable to control their urge to go on-line to satisfy whatever it is they are Internet
addicted to. Poor academic performance of Facebook users has just recently become
chimed as a possible Internet disorder. Carr (2008) wrote a cover story for the Atlantic
magazine, questioning if the Internet and Google in particular are making us stupid. The
claim is that although the Internet improves multitasking skills, it decreases our ability to
concentrate on things like a research article, and leaves us ingesting less educational,
more entertaining material. Rather than read a book on a topic, we Google it, getting
less depth in the information we receive and rather just the surface skimming effect.
This is a thanks in part to the media attention given to Aryn Karpinski and her co-author
Adam Duberstein of Ohio Dominican University. Their study, which was presented at
the annual meeting of the American Education Research Association on April 16, 2009,
found the college students who log on daily to Facebook have significantly lower grade-
point averages (GPAs) than those who do not (Hamilton, 2009). The actual study
remains unpublished, however, although documents do exist saying the conference
report took place. In a respected Time.com article, it was reported that the Karpinski
study surveyed 219 undergraduate and graduate students and found that GPAs of
Facebook users typically ranged a full grade point lower than those of nonusers — 3.0
to 3.5 for users versus 3.5 to 4.0 (Hamilton, 2009). That Facebook could have such a
negative effect on a student’s academic experience is astounding, and something worth
consideration. The Karpinski study also found that 65 percent of Facebook users
access their account daily, often checking it several times for new messages. Some
people spend just a few minutes on the site, others spend more than an hour (MyFox,
2009). Facebook 22 Hamilton (2009) also cites a study done by Oxford University
neuroscientist Susan Greenfield who “cautioned Britain's House of Lords that social
networks like Facebook and Bebo were ‘infantilizing the brain into the state of small
children’ by shortening the attention span and providing constant instant gratification” (p.
1). To supplement this idea, UCLA neuroscientist Gary Small warns of a decreased
ability among devotees of social networks and other modern technology to read real-life
facial expressions and understand the emotional context of subtle non-verbal gestures
(Small & Vorgan, 2008). Other research performed on academic performance and
Facebook before the Karpinski study has reached differing conclusions. A study done
by Ellison, Steinfield & Lampe (2006) concluded, “The high penetration and lack of any
systematic difference between members and non- members suggests that Facebook is
having broad appeal, is not excluding particular social groups, and has not had a
noticeable effect on students' grades (note: there is no correlation between GPA and
intensity of Facebook use)” (p. 27). However, how the authors determined this remains
unstated. Most recently, the media hype associated with the Karpinski findings caused
three researchers to quickly submit a duplicate study, ending with a claim that refutes
the prior Ohio State University research (Pasek, More & Hargittai, 2009). In this study,
partially supported through Stanford University, the authors claimed the information
presented by Karpinski was mostly media hype and not adequately studied or reviewed.
“Unsophisticated outcomes” is a term they use when describing the study (p. 7) The
findings in the Pasek, More & Hargittai (2009) study specifically found that “there is no
negative relationship between Facebook use and academic performance…users were
no more or less likely to get good grades than non-users…[and in fact, we] found
evidence that Facebook Facebook 23 use was slightly more common among individuals
with higher grades” (p. 7). This is a clear contradiction to the initial Ohio State University
finding, and begs further testing to validate one or the other’s results. A separate article
bolsters this claim by pointing that the Internet actually makes us smarter and the
multitasking increase is nothing to scoff at (Anderson & Rainie 2010). Research aligning
with this train of thought points out that the link of Academic performance and Internet
use is weak and situational.

Golder, Wilkinson, and Huberman conducted large-scale study in 2005 to look at the
amount of Facebook friends in that year. Their findings showed that the average mean
of friends per Facebook user was 144 with a median of roughly 180. Research in 2008
reports Facebook use has more than doubled in a two-year period. In example, 16
percent of 14– to 22–year–olds in 2006 more than doubled to 40 percent among that
same population in 2008 (Pasekein, More & Facebook 15 Hargittai, 2009). The number
of users cited in most current studies varies from 42,089,200 active users (Corbett,
2009) to the total number of users to being substantially larger at over 350 million
patrons who have set up accounts on Facebook (Zuckerberg, 2009).

According to data gathered from several sources by OnlineEducation.net, Facebook

and Twitter are used to great benefit — sometimes. Students welcome online
engagement and resources; around 75% of student respondents said they'd like to do
some online collaboration for class, in fact.

Also, social media may have a positive impact on students' sense of themselves in the
community. Social media-using students were twice as likely as other students to feel
well-liked by their peers and to participate in extracurricular activities. And 20% more of
Facebook-using students (as compared to students who didn't use Facebook) said they
felt connected to their school and community.

However, negative effects abound. Students who use Facebook and hit the books
simultaneously found their multitasking led to 20% lower grades than those of their
more focused peers. Facebook-using students also made less money during school
from part-time work, putting in around five hours per week as opposed to 16 hours per
week for a typical, unplugged counterpart.

Not only do grades and finances suffer, but students might actually end up feeling more
depressed or lonely. Almost half of students believe they are sadder than their friends
on Facebook, and 25% of college students have shown signs of severe depression in
their status updates at one time or another.

In a word, the results are inconclusive. But with around 96% of all college students on
Facebook, only the most dedicated academics would consider giving up social media
for a slightly better GPA.

Using Facebook for log time causes low grades in studies as students give more time
and attention to their Facebook. Some students think that using Facebook will not affect
their studies and they came to know about the reality when they get their results. Most
of the times students keep using Facebook and forget to study even they don’t care
about their lunch and dinner. They make friends and chat with them. It is common trend
among Facebook users that they make fake accounts and trap others. According to
research’s, face book has been considered a great cause in breakups among many
relations.

Students forget about their other duties and start giving all the time in pursuing, what will
be the next on Facebook by them or their friends. This is really not good for students as
they must show more concern to their prior duties, their family and relatives. Access of
everything is bad, while using Facebook students should keep in mind the time limit and
other works and responsibilities which hold more importance to their life than using
Facebook.

This study demonstrated the widespread use of facebook among 98.2 % of the health
science students in a medical college of Nepal. This was found to be similar in
comparison, to studies conducted in different countries [12–14] on the same subject. In
addition to ease of connecting with friends or family, facebook’s news updates in a
variety of different categories (sports, politics, education, health etc.) encourages its
users to spend even more of their leisure time on the site. The increasing availability of
Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity), portable devices, and the popularity of facebook itself, might
have also contributed to facebook use among this population. According to Hew KF [2],
facebook has very little educational value and the participants mainly used facebook to
keep in contact with the known individuals which were found to be concurring with this
study. Moreover, this study also demonstrated that only 5 % of participants used
facebook for academic purpose, while other studies conducted by Raacke et al. [15]
and Gray et al. [13] reported academic use to be higher (10.9 and 25.5 % respectively).
This difference could be due to academic culture and varied institutional policies on the
use of internet in these institutions. While one-fourth of users in this study were found to
be accessing facebook during leisure time, when accessed regularly, there is potential
risk for developing addictive behaviours, through the development of poor self-discipline
and task avoidance [16].

A majority of the students accessed facebook on daily basis, in higher numbers than
similar past studies [13, 17]. Most of the students spent time on facebook on average,
less than 1–2 h daily, which was consistent with the findings reported by others [18, 19].
A majority of participants in this study admitted that they were on facebook until late at
night (61.5 %). A similar finding was obtained by Farooqi et al. among the students of
Dow University in Pakistan [20]. Young KS found that the university students’ sleep
patterns were disrupted due to facebook use late at night, leading to fatigue and
impaired academic performance [21]. This study also supported the findings of previous
studies [6, 17] that the majority of students accessed facebook using mobile devices.
This particular method of accessing facebook could be due to increased availability of
internet access and newer versions of operating systems on mobile devices that
support facebook use.

Similar to the previous studies [2, 6, 22], a small number of students reported that
relevant academic information was accessible through the facebook. The majority of the
participants felt that they could acquire academic assistance from other facebook users
to some degree, which was higher than a previous study conducted by Gafni and Deri
[6]. Facebook allows for rapid, easy access, and immediate interaction among students
and their teachers. This use of facebook can facilitate rapid consultation and
dissemination of lecture notes, prior exam information, and other information, much
more quickly than using traditional methods of learning. As a result, facebook has been
found to be effective in obtaining information quickly from others, saving time, and
money [6]. However, Hew [2] reviewed that only a minimal number of facebook users
actually asked for assistance from facebook friends, while most of the students
preferred discussing their personal life over their studies. Therefore, spending time on
facebook may significantly compromise a student’s academic success. In this study,
67.5 % of the users admitted that facebook negatively affected their studies, which was
higher than the finding of a previous study by Farooqi et al. [20].

The data from previous studies clearly indicated that the excessive use of social media,
compromises actual live social interaction and academic accomplishments. It may also
be associated with relationship problems, personal loneliness, and depression [23, 24].
We found that very small population (8.6 %) spent more time on facebook than live
interactions with others, unlike the result obtained by the previous study [20]. However,
17.4 % of participants indicated that facebook was a source of inspiration and
motivation for them. This is consistent with the findings of Farooqi et al. who observed
that many students admitted that excessive facebook use had ruined their social life,
causing them to spend less time with their loved ones [20]. Moreover, the researchers
at the University of Southern California reported that an increasing number of people,
admitted to spending less time with their family members as result of excessive use of
the internet, including social networking sites [25].

Young people have an increased tendency to develop additive behaviour with facebook
use. However, they are usually unaware of this additive behaviour [20]. In this study,
one-fourth of the users found it difficult to spend an entire day without accessing
facebook. Half of them complained of feeling irritated when they were disturbed while
using facebook, which was consistent with the findings of previous studies [17, 20].
More than half of the participants received complaints from their family or friends about
the amount of time they spent on facebook. As these are some of the key components
in determining the facebook addiction according to ‘Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale
(BFAS)’ [26], this supports the theory that these participants possibly have some degree
of facebook addiction. Sharifah et al. identified the negative behavioural consequences
of social networking as: hyperactivity, attention deficit, depression, and multi-tasking
mania [27]. Thus, proper education regarding the use of social media is needed.
As with any other technology facebook is not unique for eliciting both positive and
negative effects on its users. Previous studies have shown adverse effects similar to
computer use, such as: headache, backache, weight change, and eye problems
[17, 28]. Of those reported by the users in this study, burning eyes, disturbed sleep, and
headache were the most common reported adverse health effects. On the other hand,
23.2 % of participants denied experiencing any adverse effects. Sierra et al. stated that
both quantity and quality of sleep might strongly influence mood [29] and subjective
well-being, which in turn could impact the academic performance [21, 30] of the
students who use facebook late at night and do not allow for sufficient sleep. Al-Dubai et
al. had clearly indicated a significant association between facebook use, its adverse
health effects, and unhealthy behavior. They have recommended that higher
educational institutions should create awareness and safer practices for their students.
Additionally, they have advocated regular health screening of students to avoid the
possible health consequences due to facebook use [31].

Although a majority of students (71.5 %) claimed that they tried to reduce their time
spent on facebook, one-fourth of them were not successful indicating additive behavior,
consistent with the result found by Farooqi et al. [20]. It is worth mentioning that the
students were willing to invest more of their time on their studies rather than on
facebook. Further studies in a large population may reveal the factors associated with
positive and negative impacts of facebook use among the health science students.

Since information technology is rapidly evolving, popular social networks like facebook,
could be used by the educational institutions for academic purposes, such as uploading
data and sharing educational materials. It is likely that more students will use social
sites like facebook in future, as more attractive features are offered to their users. This
will undoubtedly affect the students’ learning process and have an impact on their
health and personal life. Therefore, new approaches and tools need to be developed for
evaluating the facebook use and its consequences among students.

Excessive use of facebook, a popular social network site, has important positive and
negative effects on the academics, social interactions, and health of the health science
students in this study. With limited academic benefits, excessive use of facebook may
actually increase the risk of facebook additive behavior, resulting in less time spent on
academics. It is important to involve the parents of students, educational institutions,
and the facebook authority, to collaborate on how to encourage students to limit social
media usage and bring awareness to the consequences of excessive use, especially
among the student population.