Internet and Social Media Usage of Secondary School Students in Rural Areas

With the developments in the field of technology, significant changes occurred in means of communication. Rapid extension of internet access across the world made it possible for people to communicate each other without time and space limitations. Especially the innovative Web 2.0 technologies, which evolved in the beginning of millennium, made people possible to create and share their own contents. Today, people in all age groups across the world increasingly use internet and social media for several purposes and this development opened the door for new research activities to scholars. Various studies showed that with some geographical and demographical differences, it could be said that internet usage was increasing rapidly in almost everywhere in the world. Based on the argument that internet and social media usage could vary across people with different demographical features, this study was conducted to understand social media and internet usage of secondary school students from three different schools located in rural areas of the city of Konya. Survey was applied to secondary school students whose ages differed from 10 to 15. The schools were in villages, located 37– 87 kilometers far from Konya's city center. Data collected from students were analyzed with SPSS program. Students' access to the internet, duration of their internet and social media usage, their social media preferences were interpreted in terms of demographical features and the educational background of the family of the students. No statistically significant relations were found between sex and internet usage, and between family's education level and internet usage; however, statistically significant relations were found between sex and purpose of internet usage.