Discussion & Conclusion section of Research Paper
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Final Research Paper
2019/4/26
The Significance of Social Media for International Students
Abstract
Social media has become a part of life for most youth in today’s world. It has revolutionized the interaction of people, spreading of information, and has affected people’s feelings when they face various circumstances. These changes have come with both positive and negative influences that impact those who use social media platforms, directly. The research seeks to identify the role of social media in the lives of international students studying in America. To come up with the hypothesis, questionnaires will be administered to some of the international students; and for those who are easily accessible, they will be interviewed. From the results, the hypothesis formulated is that social media helps international students conform to new cultures, or at least some aspects of the culture, and the way of life in their host countries. Social media also helps them draw social support from those around them.
Keywords: social media, platform, international student, influence.
Introduction
Social media is a channel through which people share information, exchange news, and maintain social relationships. In this context, social media is defined as all the platforms through which people generate media and spread it to other people with minimum restrictions. International students find life to be challenging when they migrate to new countries for their studies. Usually, they know no one, or only a few numbers of people, in their host countries. Thus, they find that their life ends up revolving around their studies. In such cases, life becomes mundane and boring. Consequently, they often resort to social media as they seek to make life more exciting and stimulating. Through social media, they get to interact, form networks and understand the culture of people in their new environment. They also get easy ways of contacting, and keeping in touch with their families and friends in their home countries.
Literature Review
The number of international students has been growing continuously because of a high number of opportunities that foreign people can gain in the United States. International students experience adaptive processes while accommodating themselves to live in a foreign country. Social media is a helpful assistant for international students to understand life in the United States, obtain new friends, and accept a new lifestyle. For this reason, such researchers as Haijing Tu, Ly Tran, Catherine Gomes, Momoko Fujita, Paul Harrigan, and Geoffrey Norman Soutar have investigated the significance of social media for international students in comparison with American students by means of diverse methods and analyses.
The cultural adaptation in the form of social behaviors, language preferences, values, and friendship are the main aspects that impact on international students` lives and their use of foreign language in social media. Haijing Tu provided the investigated matter in English Versus Native Language on Social Media: International Students' Cultural Adaptation in the U.S, by referring to the coding data into friendship, social norms, values, and language preferences (Tu, 2018). The author researched twelve international students who provided information about their choices and functions of the used language across social media. According to the research, international students practice the English language in social media due to higher accuracy and modernity of foreign language. The young who obtains an in-depth knowledge of English and has the opportunities for practicing the speech, present themselves as a forward-minded and highly intelligent part of society. Another critical reason why international students refer to English across social media is the use of the language as an instrument for study, work, and communication with the native population. In the English speaking environment, foreign learners need to enhance their knowledge to “compete on equal footing” with native speakers for favorable positions and appropriate marks. Additionally, international students use the English language in social media with purposes of broadening the circle of contacts in the United States and achieving the highest goals. Therefore, Haijing Tu illustrates that English language and social media help international students to adapt to the foreign environment and solve such problem as the social gap between foreign and native students, which was discussed in International Student Connectedness and Identity: Transnational Perspectives by Ly Tran and Catherine Gomes.
International students face different problems throughout the study in a foreign country, aside from issues with communication and friendship, learners experience the complexity of the educational process due to the language barrier. Ly and Gomes demonstrate the example of Australian students whose honesty and skills were disputed by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's (ABC) Four Corners (Ly & Gomes, 2017). The program criticized international students who presented unpreparedness for English education due to the incompleteness of language knowledge and lack of required practices. The students should have referred to native speakers for assistance in writing and analyzing diverse tasks in English. The Australian students became opponents towards such frustrating conclusions and emphasized the real problems in the form of miscommunication and cultural differences between foreign and native population. Therefore, students need to overcome cultural and ethical barriers with the help of various events and groups that can be implemented across social media for the learning generation. The author accents the importance of the relationship between international and American students. The cooperation of different nations can expand frontiers for international students by establishing connections and enhancing post-study opportunities. The favorable positions of international students in American society afford opportunities for job placement and development. Ly Tran and Catherine Gomes encourage the use of online networks and the creation of intercultural experiences all over the entire world. The same as Ly and Gomes state about the significance of social media for international students, other authors such as Fujita, Harrigan, and Soutar demonstrate the influence of social media platform on the learning process in the work International students’ engagement in their university’s social media.
The lifestyle of international students are substantially distinguishable from native learners due to the uninhabited environment and norms; however, foreign learners can become a part of the local community through the use of social media. Fujita, Harrigan, and Soutar are writers who investigated the understanding of “the lived experiences of the international students using their university’s social media, through a lens of customer engagement (CE) in the services marketing literature” (Fujita, Harrigan, & Soutar, 2017). The authors surveyed ten international students regarding their participation in colleges` social networks and the main purposes of the engagement. Following the results, the foreign learners tend to use social media aiming to acculturate their values and establish their own identity among the native population. Being subscribers for particular social networks, international students present themselves as a part of the surrounding public and indispensable constituent of students life. The learners understand the relevance of their actions and broaden collaboration with their colleagues willingly. The researchers illustrate how social media improve the level of communication about design, estimates, and commitments. Therefore, international students are engaged in collegiate life on an equality with their native colleagues by virtue of social media; such inspiring teamwork provokes the feeling of proud and significance across international students. Consequently, Fujita, Harrigan, and Soutar demonstrated how foreign students could interact with local learners by discussing school topics and increasing their level of belonging.
Methodology
Administering questionnaires and interviews were the two methods considered to be the most appropriate for data collection. Questionnaires could be administered anonymously, and thus, prompt the respondents to give full information without any anxiety. On the other hand, interviews give the interviewers a chance of accessing the mood of the respondents, for a more insightful view of the respondents’ experience.
Questionnaires were used to collect most of the respondents’ views. The hypothesis, “social media has a positive influence on social support and adjustment on international students living in America” was used as the default assertion. Furthermore, another assertion was made that the use of social media platforms enhanced the process of social adjustment to new locations. Collection of data using both tools was then conducted within the limited time available.
Finding
Most of the comments from respondents were diverse in nature, depending on the respondent’s personality. For instance, an outgoing international student was likely to comment and say that they liked Instagram, had many American and International student friends on the app as followers, and that they interacted with them on the platform. In contrast, an introverted student is likely to say that all they do is stay at home with their phone or computer, with no active interactions; and that was all the social life they had.
Many international students use social media to keep in touch with friends and families from their countries of origin. For instance, one student might say that as a sophomore, they had used WeChat app to call home and avoided the direct, and quite expensive, transoceanic calls. They might even say that they felt alone and abandoned because they did not have friends, and thus, kept in touch with family and friends in China through WeChat. On the other hand, another student, who seemed totally locked out of associations with American people could say that all they do is stay at home with their phone or computer, with no active interactions; and that social media was all the social life they had. Such responses depict the over-reliance on social media.
Ethnic background has been found to be an influence on the social media platform that an individual prefers. Most Chinese student respondents use WeChat as their favorite social media site. They also use the other platforms, but on a smaller scale; or only to interact with people those from other ethnic groups. From the interview, one of the Chinese respondents would say that most of the friends he/she has are Chinese, and thus, they still use WeChat often, if not always. However, another Chinese International student would say that he/she does not own a Facebook account, and thus, talks to American classmates about classwork through GroupMe or WhatsApp. This may imply that many Chinese students are accustomed to using WeChat.
Most social media users start developing psychological dependence and addiction to social media. From the questionnaire, 70 percent of the respondents said, they could not be away from social media for 3 successive hours. 82.6 percent of those who took part in the survey said that they spend 2 or more hours a day on social media. 73.9 percent of the respondents use social media without self-control, and they visit as many sites as they want to. A stereotype interviewee could say “WeChat seems to be the only social media I have with my friends. Even when no one sends me a message, I still habitually check WeChat maybe every ten minutes. Sometimes I will continue to refresh my friends' circle page and feel anxious if there are no new
Some social media users have realized how much it costs them on time and addiction, and have tried reversing the process. For those who reported to have tried to avoid social media, 67 percent made their greatest effort only for a day, 27 percent for less than three days, and the remaining 6 percent for about a week. From the results, it became apparent that international students are becoming addictively dependent on social media. Majority of them could not do without it for a day.
Conclusively, social media helps international students to quickly adapt to their new environment. Some stereotype interviewees could say “My social media helped me adapt with people over here, because coming from a different culture, I didn’t know what people are going to be like over here. So, when they would talk about things that are recent over here and ‘this is how we do it in America’, I didn’t exactly copy the thing. So that helped me get familiar with the culture over here and get to know people.” A different student said “Social media helped me in a major way to adapt and learn about the culture that I’m living in. There is a lot I gained from Facebook to learn about the American culture to stay with the main events happening in this country.
Figure1: Sample diagrams to describe the findings; adapted from reports in the research.
Conclusion
From the findings, it is clear that people with different personalities use social media for similar purposes. Additionally, some international students have become psychologically dependent on social media, mostly because they draw their social support from it.
From the results, the hypothesis formulated is that social media helps international students conform to new cultures, or at least some aspects of the culture, and the way of life in their host countries. Social media also helps them draw social support from those around them.
References
Tu, H. (2018). English Versus Native Language on Social Media: International Students' Cultural Adaptation in the U.S.. Journal of International Students, 8(4), 1709-1721. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1468074
Ly, T. T., &Gomes, C. (Eds.). (2017). International Student Connectedness and Identity: Transnational Perspectives. Singapore: Springer.
Fujita, M., & Harrigan, P., & Soutar, G. N. (2017). International students’ engagement in their university’s social media. The International Journal of Educational Management, 31(7). 1119-1134. https://doi.org/10.1108/ ijem-12-2016-0260
