IMPACT OF FACEBOOK ADDICTION ON ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE AMONG UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS

BACKGROUND The online social networking is rapidly changing the lives of human beings. Young people especially students are more addicted to new technologies and to online social networking site. The popularity of social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Whatsapp continue to grow and making remarkable changes in world now a day. OBJECTIVE To analyze the impact of Facebook addiction on academic performance, self-esteem and intelligence quotient (IQ) level among the undergraduate students. METHODOLOGY This is a cross sectional observational study, that was conducted on undergraduate students of College of Physical Therapy. 150 undergraduate PT students (males and females) of second, third, fourth and fifth years were included in this study, who have been using Facebook from 8 months or above. RESULT Among 150 students, 83 (55.33%) participants were Facebook addicted, whereas 67 (44.67%) participants were not addicted to Facebook. The age of the students range from 18 to 25 years and the mean age of all students was 21.7 years. There was a significant association between Facebook addiction with academic performance of students according to their GPA (p-value =0.00), with IQ level (p value = 0.00), and with self-esteem level (p-value = 0.00) of students. CONCLUSION Frequent use of Facebook in students makes them addicted, that affects their academic performance, IQ level and self-esteem.