Does Facebook Lead to Lower Grades

by Chelsea Haedrich

A 19-year-old sophomore at the University of Delaware, checks her Facebook around seven times a day, racking up around an hour and a half per day on the site.

“If it wasn’t for me going on Facebook during class I probably wouldn’t have failed my economics exam this morning,” she said.

Students who are Facebook users study less and get lower grades, according to one study.

Aryn Karpinski, a professor at Ohio State University, conducted a study comparing the differences in academic achievement of Facebook users and non-users and found that the GPA’s generally ranged from 3.0 to 3.5 for Facebook users and from 3.5-4.0 for non-users. She also found that Facebook users averaged one to five hours of studying per week, whereas non-users generally studied eleven to fifteen hours per week.

This study however, did not imply that Facebook is a direct cause of lower grades.

Karpinski emphasized that a correlation between the two does not equal causation and that the grade association could be caused by other variables.

“There are many third variables that could be influencing the relationship”, said Karpinski “Perhaps major, time spent in paid work, or extracurricular activities, or access. Ultimately, anything that ‘takes away’ from study time could be another factor to consider.”

If Facebook did not exist, these students might spend their time engaged in other activities that might interfere with studying.

Karpinski’s study was administered to students using a simple self report survey. 219 undergraduate and graduate students were surveyed. 148 of the 219 students were Facebook members. Only 29 percent of Facebook users believed that their social networking had an effect on their grades. The majority of those who believed it had an impact on them reported poor time management skills and that Facebook use allows them to put off studying.

Facebook has become the new craze in social networking since 2004 when Harvard student Mark Zuckerburg created the site that now has over 500 million users worldwide.

The popularity of Facebook is especially evident in college lecture halls. Often students whose professors allow laptops in class will spend some time on Facebook during their lecture.

Not all students who fare poorly in their studies are Facebook members.

Justin Apold, a sophomore at Boston College, believes that Facebook has an effect on his grades. He said he used to deactivate his Facebook when he had a lot of work and permanently deleted Facebook about a year ago.

“I am much happier now, I am able to spend more time on my work and I no longer think ‘where did the time go’ as I did when I would waste valuable time on Facebook,” he said. Apold has a 3.8 GPA.

Meagan Gallagher, an avid Facebook user and a student at Adelphi University, says she racks up around one to three hours cumulatively on the site each day. Yet, she maintains a 3.6 GPA.

Jenna Lussier, a sophomore at Stonehill College constantly checks her Facebook throughout the say. “It definitely aids in procrastination,” she said. However, Lussier has a 3.9 GPA.