Challenges in the Era of Globalization - iaabd

Postgraduate 19
Internet experience < 1 year 7
1 – < 3 years 9
3 - < 5 years 22
5 - < 7 years 23
7+ years 39
Challenges in the Era of Globalization
Edited by Emmanuel Obuah
Questionnaire
The instrument used was developed from the literature as well from questions in past SNS studies. The
questionnaire was pre-tested on 7 undergraduate students to ensure that questions would be understood by
the target sample. Refer to Appendix A for a copy of the questionnaire.
Data Analysis
Because of the small sample and categorical nature of the data, frequencies and nonparametric tests
including Mann-Whitney U tests and Pearson’s Chi-squares were utilised to address research objectives.
SPSS v.18 was used for data analysis.
Findings and Discussion
The findings are discussed in the order of the research questions.
RQ1: What are the Internet usage habits of students?
Social network sites use the Internet as a connectivity platform. Effectively, social networking activity is
influenced by: (1) hardware or device used to access the Internet, (2) type of Internet connection, and (3)
features supported by an SNS. These three factors determine the different features such as downloading/
uploading pictures or Instant Messaging accessible to subscribers. Hence, the need to investigate
participants’ Internet habits, which includes Internet experience, daily Internet usage, and the mode of
connection used. Frequencies, percentages, and nonparametric tests were used to answer the research
question.
Internet experience
In this context Internet experience refers to the total number of years participants have been using the
Internet. Table 1 illustrates that only less than 7 per cent of the respondents have used the Internet for less
than a year. Those with between one and three years constitute 9 per cent of the respondents. 45
respondents had at least three years Internet experience, representing some 84 per cent of the sample.
Further analysis shows that the median Internet experience is 6 years, indicating that a significant number
of respondents started using the Internet whilst they were teenagers. This corroborates findings by Bicen
and Cavus (2010) and later by the World Internet Usage Statistics (WIUS) (2011) that the Internet is
increasingly playing an important role among youths.
To determine whether the level of study influences Internet experience, the Chi-square test of association
was performed. To render the Chi-square test more robust, Internet experience and level of study
variables were transformed into dichotomous variables resulting in a 2x2 contingency table. Internet
experience was divided into up to 5 years Internet experience (low experience) and over 5 years Internet
experience (high experience). Level of study was re-coded into high school students and university
students. The subsequent Chi-square test yielded significant results (x 2 = 6.633; p = .010) at the 0.05 level
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