Analysis of Mobile Phone Impact on Student Academic Performance in Tertiary Institution

Abstract

The usage of Internet enabled mobile phones is a 21st century experience which covers various operations. This research work examines phone usage and identified the effects internet enabled mobile phones have on the academic performance of students at the tertiary institutions using the Federal Polytechnic students of Ilaro, Ogun State in Nigeria as a case study. The research work was performed so as to understand and also find the correlation between academic performance of students and the usage of mobile phone during class hours which is general believed to be an avenue of distractions to students. The information from this work was carried out using structured questionnaires administered to 45 students to get their individual views. In addition 15 extensive interviews were done concurrently to have a grounded knowledge of the students with the data gathered during the course of this study. Our findings indicated that students are influenced negatively to a great extent by the mobile phone because attention is focused on chatting, music and others while their academic activities are neglected and left to suffer. Also, this study discovered that the use of mobile phone is uncontrollable among students which are the leading cause of poor academic performance among students.