The Impact of Social Media on Students’ Self-Esteem: Findings From A University In Masvingo, Zimbabwe

The explored the impact of social media on university students’ self-esteem. The research was limited to 120 Great Zimbabwe University (GZU) students who were surveyed, and a self-administered structured questionnaire was used. The students were selected from the Faculty of Social Sciences in the Department of Psychology. Stratified random sampling which is a probability sampling technique was used to select the participants. The data was analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21.0. Spearman correlation test and the Chi Square test were used. Findings indicate that there is a negative relationship between social media usage and self-esteem, self-confidence, and feelings of competence. The study indicate that the more frequent the students visit social media sites the lower their self-esteem, self-confidence and feelings of competence tend to be. However, students who spend an average of 3 hours per day on social media recorded high levels of self-esteem, self-confidence, and feelings of competence. This led to the conclusion that social media is a double-edged sword whose impact can be either negative or positive depending on time spent on it. This study recommends that universities conduct awareness campaigns aimed at exposing the negative psychological effects of excessive use of social media with a view to reduce curb same. Furthermore future studies may need to focus on the causal relationship that exists between each social media site and various psychological conditions as little research has been done in that regard despite the unprecedented concurrent surge in psychological disorders and social media usage among the 21st century’s young adults.