Students’ Perception of the Importance of Using Facebook for Academic Purposes / Percepcije studenata o važnosti upotrebe Facebooka za akademske svrhe

Abstract

Facebook as the most popular social network, has found great application among students, who, in addition to entertainment and communication use it for the exchange of relevant information regarding their study. Considering Facebook is the most used social network among the student population, the aims of this research were to analyse the key factors that motivate students to use Facebook, identify reasons for using Facebook as well as the potential of its use for academic purposes. The basic research instrument is a structured questionnaire. The survey was conducted in September 2016 at the Belgrade Banking Academy for the purposes of this study. There were 159 participants-students from all years of primary and master studies. The results were analysed using the following methods: t-test, correlation coefficient and confirmatory factor analysis. The obtained results show that students mostly use Facebook for social purposes. Regarding the use for educational purposes, Facebook is the most respected platform for exchange of materials and information from lectures, communication with colleagues and creating academic groups. In recent years, a growing popularity of social networks has been observed among students, a potential to become an important source of support for educational communications and cooperation with the faculty.