Abstract
This article was migrated. The article was not marked as recommended. In addition to the potential benefits of mobile technology in (bio)medical education, mobile technology can also be used for personal use and access to social media. In this study, we explored the relation between (study-related) use of social media and exam results in a cohort of 259 Dutch students enrolled in Medicine (n=211) and Biomedical Sciences (n=48) programs. Self-reported social media use was scored for the use of internet, Facebook, Twitter, Whatsapp and SMS during teacher-supervised activities (e.g. lectures, interactive lectures and group assignments). Subsequently, students scored whether use was study-related on a continuous scale. We found a highly prevalent use of social media during teacher-supervised activities (97%), with a relatively small portion being study-related (30±24%). We divided students into: 1.Low user+low study-related, 2.Low user+high study-related, 3.High user+low study-related, and 4.High user+high study-related. Exam results did not differ between groups (ANOVA; P=0.45). Moreover, we found no relation between exam result versus social media use (r2=0.002, P=0.49) or study-related social media use (r2=0.007, P=0.18). In summary, we found no evidence that the amount and/or type of social media use during teacher-supervised activities significantly relate to exam results in a cohort of Dutch (bio)medical students.
Highlights
We are living, learning, teaching and practicing medicine in the digital era
We explored whether the use of social media during teacher-supervised activities affected exam results in Dutch studentsmedical science
We explored if the type of social media use affects the relation between social media use and exam results
Summary
We are living, learning, teaching and practicing medicine in the digital era. the use of mobile technology, including smartphones, tablets and laptops, in (bio)medical education is common practicel (Ellaway et al, 2014). We explored whether the use of social media during teacher-supervised activities (i.e. lectures, interactive lectures and group assignments) affected exam results in Dutch students (bio)medical science. This programme does not contain social media-based learning, whilst students are free to use mobile technology during teacher-supervised activities.
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