Social media escapism in students-Source map

How does escapism through social media affect college students? And what can we do to minimize the consequences?

By: Carter Amussen

solutions to the issue of overuse of phones/social media in schools

Psychological perspective on what escapism is

Explaining escapism and how that can relate to social media

Research article on social media use in students

Survey on social media use and it's affects on BSU students

This research article provides a statistical and analytical lens on the use of social media in students. This helps understands the numbers and data behind my research question and presents the issue in a scientifical manner.

role in conversation

This research article goes over the conduction of a study done on the use of socials media in students and how it affects them.

Key ideas

• One of the findings of the study found a positive correlation between escapism and students with problematic instagram usage. Making a point that the more time students spent on instagram the more feeling of escapism they, which then to the want of more instagram use, which creates a vicous cycle
• This study and many others have confirmed that students who use social media as a way to escape from their reality can result in addiction and/or problematic use in some cases
• The study also found that students who use social media during class times tend to use it as a way to not have to actively engage in the class or worry about their academic load. This then leads to worse grade, social connections and understanding of material in classes.

Overview

Maslin Masrom, 2023

"The impact of excessive Instagram use on students"

"The meaning of escapism in psychology"

Gives a psychology lens on how escapism can affect people, which gives us good insight on how it might be affecting students at BSU psychologically.

role in conversation

A psychologists, Ashley Olivine, writes a good explanation on what escapism does to people's brains. Provides us with types of escapism and how they can be beneficial and also detremential.

Key ideas

• A psychologists defines escapsim as"When a person routinely uses an activity or behavior to escape life's realities. It is a way of distracting the mind"(Olivine, 1).
• The article explains that "People seek escapism to avoid pain or discomfort that occur as a normal part of life. It is also a survival tool for the mind to use to cope with traumatic situations or memories"(Olivine, 3). This leads into the articles next point that escapism can be a healthy coping mechanism, but can become too much when the brain becomes reliant on the distraction.
• The article then goes over the types of escapism that people used, and lists many including social media. And goes into the specifics downsides of these forms of escapism.

Overview

Ashley Olivine, 2023

Provides possible solutions for cell phone use in class from the perspective of what a teacher/institution can do. Alhough this doesn't fix the issues that could go on outside of class like a student scolling tiktok for hours instead of doing homework, it at least can help those students stay focused in class.

role in conversation

This article written by assitant principal of a school in tennessee, Misty Hance, provides plausible ways to help reduce or elimate cell phone use in class. As well as giving reasoning as to why these solutions work and why it is so important that these solutions get implemented.

Key ideas

• Institutions and teachers are responsible for being the one who crack down on phone use in classrooms. If they don't students will use phones to cheat, ignore and distract from schoolwork
• The first solution this article presents is providing a cell phone agreement, which entails a clear set of rules on cell phone use and having the student and their parents sign it. I don't think this will work on it's own, but with the addition of other solutios with it
• The other solutions this article brings up that could be added in addition to the solution above are: Keeping students engaged in hands on activities, using other technology such as computers in the classroom instead, utilizing positive reinforement and as a teacher walk around watching the students.

Overview

Misty Hance, 2019

"5 ways to keep students off their cell phones in class"

• Although surveys are not the most reliable or generalizable source of statical data I was able to learn some things based on the responses, such as all 41/41 respondants saying they have used some form of social media during class, and two-thirds of them saying they check social media at least once a day during class. The most common social media used during this class time being snapchat
• This excessive use of social media use has to have a reason, the respondants had 4 options as to why they used social media in class. 1. Talking to friends, 2. boredom, 3. escaping from the class so they don't have to engage, and 4. other. 18/41 respondants put #1, 11/41 respondants put #2, 8/41 respondants put #3 and 4/41 respondants put #4
• From the answers to these questions I have come to the conclusion that there is definetly a problem within students at BSU with using social media during class time. This conclusion is even more concreted by my next question in the survey. I asked if the social media use these students have participated in have ever affected them in a negative way. 25/41 answered that the believed that social media has negatively affected their understanding of the contents of a class.
• Finally how can we fix this apparent issue. Most students believed that they can fix it on a personal level by actively not pulling out their phone or silencing it. But I believe this will not happen, we are too addicted to our technology to be able to cut it out on a personal level. We need some kind of societal change

My survey's role in the conversation correlates the findings and questions of my other sources and applies them to BSU students.

role in conversation

I conducted my own survey for the purpose of understanding how my topic relates to and affects students that go to BSU. I distributed this to my friends who go to bsu and via my social medias, so that I could get a good amount of respondants. I got 41people to fill out my survey, which included questions about their personal social media use, how they believe it affected them and their school work, and finally if they thought there was a problem with social media use in academic settings and how to fix it if they thought there is an issue.

Key ideas

Overview

Carter Asmussen, 2024

Survey

The purpose of this source for our conversation is to create an understanding about what escapism is, how it can affect people and what is used as a form of escapism. The knowledge gained from this article can then lead into a better understanding of what the other sources are talking about.

role in conversation

This article sets up a good baseline understading of what escapism is and how it can relate to social media.

Key ideas

• It defines escapism through the “Escape theory, originally suggested as an explanation for suicidal behaviors asserts that individuals who have higher standards and ideals than they can ever actually obtain are more likely to experience a need to escape from themselves or their reality” (3, griffiths). Which can correlate to social media since students can get pressured either from themselves, family or schools to perform well when they feel like they can't, so they use social media as an escape from that reality.
• The article then points out that"Several studies suggest that engaging in online activities such as playing online videogames and social media use to escape from reality, for distraction, or as a coping strategy is associated with problematic use” (12, Griffiths). Which further proves the point that social media as a form of escapism can create negative affects on the user.

Overview

Kagan Kircaburun and Mark D Griffiths, 2019

"Problematic Instagram use: The role of perceived feeling of presence and escapism"

The escapism article helps gives a base of knowledge about escapism which then you can apply to the more heavy article about the studies done on students.

These 2 articles connect in a way by looking at escapism and it's definition in 2 different fields of study. And how escapism affects a person.

The questions I raised about solutions to the problem of social media use in BSU students and in shools as a whole relate to this article. It relates to this article because is gives possible solutions that could be implemeted to fix or at least make the problem better.

My survey done on BSU sudents uses the research from this source to inform what questions I askes. As well as seing if results from surveys at BSU correlate with the findings of the studies in this article.