Abstract
This research determined five big personality traits that influenced South African Generation Y students’ habitual use of Facebook, life satisfaction and psychological well-being. The research embraced a quantitative approach, and a structured questionnaire was used to obtain information from Generation Y students. The data were analysed using Smart PLS software version 3.2.7 for partial least square structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM). Neuroticism, extraversion, openness and agreeableness had positive and significant influences on habitual Facebook usage (HFU). However, conscientiousness seemed to have a positive yet insignificant relationship with HFU. Habitual use of Facebook has been found to have a positive and significant impact on life satisfaction and psychological well-being. It was also determined that life satisfaction positively and significantly influences psychological well-being. The exogenous-to-endogenous outcomes from the structural model coincided with most of prior study’s findings. Therefore, in the light of the associated literature, the findings were discussed. This study is intended to add a fresh understanding to the current body of Africa’s personality, psychology and social media literature – a context that has received little research attention in developing nations.
Highlights
Individuals can be categorised based on various parameters, such as their height, weight, gender, age, generation and level of education, as well as their character (Naude et al 2016)
The statistical analysis exposed that neuroticism positively and significantly impacts habitual Facebook usage (HFU) among Generation Y students
This finding has ample support from previous empirical research studies, such as that conducted by Hwang (2017), who discovered that college students with high neuroticism scores predicted Facebook activities including sharing photos with others and updating their profiles
Summary
Individuals can be categorised based on various parameters, such as their height, weight, gender, age, generation and level of education, as well as their character (Naude et al 2016). Previous academics have performed their research in different environments within the South African context, by concentrating on the role of the five major variables in predicting job creation propensities among administrative staff in a South African tertiary institution (Bell & Njoli 2016); the connection between personality dimensions and work performance of staff of a corporate pharmacy group in the North West Province, the Free State, Mpumalanga and Gauteng (Rothmann & Coetzer 2003); the connection between the five major personality characteristics and burnout in South African college learners (Morgan & De Bruin 2010); assessment of personality characteristics connected with work satisfaction among South African anaesthetists using the Big Five Inventory (Kisten & Kluyts 2018); exploration of personality characteristics, carefulness and feeling of consistency among females in Greater Schooling South Africa (Mayer, Surtee & Visser 2016); and personality characteristics and resilience as predictors of work pressure and burnout among call centre workers (Lamb 2009) While these studies are informative, they did not examine how neuroticism, extraversion, openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness influence HFU, life satisfaction and psychological well-being of Generation Y Students in South Africa. This behavioural pattern may lead from elevated rates of anxiety in people with greater neuroticism characteristics, which may be explained by an enhanced need for social support (Ross et al 2009)
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