Effect of Digital Fluency on the Usage of Social Media: An Empirical Study of Research Students of the University of the Punjab

Abstract

Digital fluency is the ability to efficiently and ethically interpret information, discover meaning, design content, create knowledge, and communicate ideas in a technologically connected world. Digital fluency refers to the skills that are useful for the academics of the 21^st century. These skill sets are also useful for the better usage of digital technologies. A study aims to investigate the effect of digital fluency on using social media in the context of Facebook based on gratification theory. The study determines how the research students of the University of the Punjab deal with social media in perceiving social gratifications with the help of digital fluency. The student’s engagements with social media in terms of broadening social networks, maintaining ties, enjoyment, tension release, and information need fulfillment explored empirically.  A quantitative research design was used and a questionnaire was formulated to collect the data from the research students of the University of the Punjab. The data were gathered by the 243 research students the users of Facebook from different faculties of Punjab University.

The results of the study show the positive relationship between digital fluency and the use of social media in terms of broadening social networks, maintaining ties, enjoyment, tension release, and information need fulfillment. This study may also be helpful for researchers to deal with social media effectively and efficiently. This study may provide guidelines to the research students for becoming digitally fluent. The study will demonstrate the core competencies of the 21^st century in terms of digital fluency among the research students.