Addiction of Internet and Performance of a Third Year Student

A recent draft manuscript suggested that Facebook use might be related to lower academic achievement in college and graduate school (Karpinski, 2009). The report quickly became a media sensation and was picked up by hundreds of news outlets in a matter of days. However, the results were based on correlational data in a draft manuscript that had not been published, or even considered for publication. This paper attempts to replicate the results reported in the press release using three data sets: one with a large sample of undergraduate students from the University of Illinois at Chicago, another with a nationally representative cross sectional sample of American 14– to 22–year–olds, as well as a longitudinal panel of American youth aged 14–23. In none of the samples do we find a robust negative relationship between Facebook use and grades. Indeed, if anything, Facebook use is more common among individuals with higher grades. We also examined how changes in academic performance in the nationally representative sample related to Facebook use and found that Facebook users were no different from non–users.

Contents
Introduction
The FG study
Prior research
The current examination
Methods
Results
Discussion
Limitations and future studies
Conclusions

Introduction
The proliferation of social networking sites has exploded in recent years, with an especially significant increase in membership levels as seen in the case of Facebook. In the nationally representative sample used in this study, Facebook users accounted for 16 percent of 14– to 22–year–olds in 2006 and 40 percent among that same population in 2008. Indeed, with over 200 million unique users, Facebook use may have a sizable real–world impact (Zuckerberg, 2009). Hence, as use of the social networking site has expanded, a variety of studies have attempted to understand the correlates and potential effects of using the medium.

Researchers examining Facebook use from a media effects