Correlation of Ph

sical Activit

and Social Media Use of Students

Jonar T. Martin, Elizabeth M. Acampad,

Regina A. Baligad,

Anatalia E. Larce

and Michael E. Santos

Physical Education Department, College of Education, Angeles University Foundation Mc Arthur Hi-way, Angeles City,

Philippines

martin.jonar@auf.edu.ph

Keywords: Physical activity, Social Media Use, Physical Education, Exercise.

Abstract:

The purpose of the study was to examine the association between physical activity participation and social

media use among college students. A convenience sample of college students (N = 58) from a private

university voluntarily participated in this study. Participants self-reported their daily physical activity for two

weeks and completed the Use of Social Media Questionnaire. Descriptive and correlation statistical analyses

were conducted to describe the physical activity participation and social media use of students. Results of the

study indicated that majority of the students who participated in the study have a sedentary physical activity

level. It was indicated that the participants had very high internet use in terms of hours per day and moderately

high social media use in terms of days per month. Moreover, data revealed that the students’ social media use

was not associated with physical activity participation. This means that the extent of social media use was

not a determining factor on the students’ participation level in physical activity. However, due to the low

level of physical activity it is recommended that students increase their physical activity in order to maintain

a healthy and active lifestyle.

1 INTRODUCTION

Physical fitness nowadays is considered a powerful

marker of health status (Warburton, Nicol, & Bredin,

2006; Owen et al., 2010) which can be achieved by

being physically active (Heron & Bradshaw, 2010;

Warburton, Nicol, & Bredin, 2006; WHO, 2011).

Physical activity promotion is viewed to address the

problem of obesity, which the world is facing in

epidemic rates (James, 2004; WHO, 2011). Yet, a

large percentage of the population does not meet the

minimum activity guidelines necessary for good

health (Guthold et al., 2008; Haskell et al., 2007). In

particular, researchers have reported a considerable

decrease in the levels of physical activity in young

people (Sue et al., 2002; Tomkinson, 2007), which is

also true in the Philippines (Tanchoco et al., 2005).

As stated by Tudor-Locke, Bassett, Swartz, et al.,

(2004), the most famous and practical type of

physical activity that people are engaged in a regular

basis is walking, which people do in many activities

of daily living such as recreational, transportation and

occupational (Bassett, et al., 2000). Yet, people do not

reach the recommended amount of steps for either

health or fitness.

One factor contributing to young people’s

physical inactivity is internet use. Previous research

has illustrated that decreased in physical activity is

associated with more time spent on the internet (Ross

et al., 2009; Zimmerman-Sloutskis et al., 2010). A

vast majority of students have internet access and

own smartphones that allow access to social

networking sites (Buffardi & Campbell, 2008; Ross

et al., 2009). It has been suggested that time spent on

social networking sites comes at the expense of other

activities. Moreover, social media has made it easy

for many to become lethargic and less inclined to go

outdoors just for some exercise or even working out

at home. In contrast, in a study conducted by Zach

and Lissitsa, (2010), they found out that long hours

spent in front of a computer screen doesn't generally

take time away from physical activity, which

contradicts the widespread assumption that time spent

on surfing the web comes at the expense of an active

lifestyle. The contrasting result of the studies needed

further research to make a significant conclusion on

the relationship between social media use and

physical activity. Likewise, studies have investigated

the effect of internet use to health and physical

activity but few on the use of social networking.

In a time when it is increasingly likely for students

to become physically inactive, it is important to

understand the relationship between students’ social

media use and their physical activity level. The

purpose of the study, therefore, is to investigate the

students’ social media use in relation to their physical

370

Martin, J., Acampad, E., Baligad, R., Larce, A. and Santos, M.

Correlation of Physical Activity and Social Media Use of Students.

In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Sports Science, Health and Physical Education (ICSSHPE 2017) - Volume 1, pages 370-374

ISBN: 978-989-758-317-9

activity levels. The study sought to answer the

following questions:

1. What is the physical activity participation

level of the college students?

2. What is the extent of usage of social media

among college students in terms of?

2.1. Hours per day

2.2. Days per week

3. Is there a significant relationship between

the students’ physical activity participation

level and social media use?

2 METHODS

2.1 Research Design and Participants

A convenience sample of college students (N = 65)

from a private university voluntarily participated in

this study. Participants included both males (n = 28)

and females (n = 37). Of the 65 participants who

began the study, 58 completed the research. Two (2)

Male and 5 female participants did not complete the

study due to non-compliance to protocol. Participants

completed the research by wearing the pedometer for

the two-week period and provided both step and

survey data. Age range of the participants was 15 to

19 years with a mean age of 17 with a mean age of

17. No age restriction was placed on the college

participants. Participants were of varying activity

levels, since the convenience sample was physical

education classes. However, current involvement in

exercise was neither a requirement nor an

exclusionary factor for participation in this study.

2.2 Instruments

2.2.1 Walking Activity Recording Log

A walking activity-recording log was created for

participants to record step data per day generated

from the pedometer. Data were submitted to the

researchers at the end of two weeks. According to

Tudor-Locke et al., (2004), minimum of three days is

considered to offer reliable information for

determining average daily steps, as long as Sunday is

included as one of the three days. At the orientation,

participants were given instructions and practiced

correct placement of the pedometer and were

constantly reminded through their social media

accounts. Pedometers according to researchers are

easy to use and less expensive (Haines, et al., 2007;

Tudor-Locke & Myers, 2001) and can quantitatively

measure the amount of physical activity throughout a

given time period (Behrens & Dinger, 2003; Behrens,

et al., 2005), and can practically be used with large

population (Tudor-Locke & Meyers, 2001).

2.2.2 The Use of Social Media Questionnaire

This written questionnaire was adopted from Pew

Internet and American Life Project’s “Social

Networking Websites and Teens Survey” by Lenhart,

Purcell, Smith, and Zickuhr, (2010). Only the time

spent per day and per week questions in the survey

was included to gather information on the

participants’ usage of social media. The questions on

the instrument were designed to satisfy the research

questions as set forth in the introduction of this study.

2.3 Procedure

Prior to the onset of the study and any data collection,

approval was given by the authorities concerned of a

private university in Angeles City, Pampanga,

Philippines. The convenience sampling was chosen

due to time limitations and researcher accessibility to

participants. The opportunity to be a participant in the

research study was announced in several sophomore

college physical education classes in a voluntary basis

without any exchange of course credit. The

researchers provided an overview of the research

design, along with its purpose. The respondents were

given verbal and written assurance of their anonymity

and that all information exchange will be

confidential.

All participants were instructed to self-report their

walking activity for two weeks with the use of the

walking activity recording log. Participants were

instructed to record their pedometer data logs each

day. During this period, participants were instructed

not to purposefully increase their amount of daily

physical activity and social media use, but rather to

simply perform their normal, everyday activities. At

the end of two weeks, the researchers met with

participants to collect the walking activity log and to

complete the research surveys – 1) Walking activity

recording log and 2) The Use of Social Media

Questionnaire.

2.4 Data Analysis

The statistical analysis was conducted in the

following order: descriptive statistics and Pearson

correlation. Prior to statistical analyses, the normality

and missing values were examined. For the

descriptive statistics, the mean and standard deviation

were computed. Furthermore, Spearman rho

Correlation of Physical Activity and Social Media Use of Students

371

correlation was done to examine relationships

between physical activity level and social media use.

Statistical analysis was completed with the Statistical

Package for the Social Sciences software (2008),

version 17.0.

3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

3.1 Physical Activity Level and Social

Media Use

Table 1 shows the mean and standard deviation of the

study variables. As shown in the table, the

participants’ average walk per day (N=58, M=4,284+

291) indicated that they were way below the

recommended number of steps per day of 10,000

steps/day which is a popular guideline by which

minimum activity levels for good health can be

achieved (Tudor-Locke & Myers, 2001). This finding

is similar to that of Hackman and Mintah, (2010) and

Martin and Santos, (2015) where likewise identified

the same findings that participants failed to meet the

minimum recommended guidelines on number of

steps per day.

Table 1: Mean and standard deviation of physical activity

and internet use (N=58).

Variable M SD

Internet Use-Hours/Day 4.896 .55

Internet Use-Hours/Day 3.431 1.39

PA 4294 291

Figure 1 shows that a big number of respondents can

be classified as ‘sedentary’; whereas, only a small number

of participants are highly active. The walking activity level

of the participants was described based on the proposed

activity level indices relative to average daily steps by

Tudor-Locke et al., (2004). This finding is consistent with

the researches of Hackman and Mintah, (2010) and Martin

and Santos, (2015) which revealed that college participants

were below the ideal physical activity level.

For the participants’ social media use, the participants’

have very high Internet Usage in terms of hours per day

(M=4.896 + .55) and moderately high internet usage in

terms of days per month (M=3.431 + 1.39).

Figure 1: Participants’ average walk per day (N=58).

3.2 Relationship between PA and Social

Media Use

A Spearman rho correlation was conducted to test the

relationship between physical activity participation

and social media use (Table 2). As shown in the table,

physical activity participation was not associated with

social media use in terms of hours per day (rho=.256,

p-value> .05) and day per month (rho=-.114, p-

value> .05). Result confirmed the findings of Zach

and Lissitsa, (2010) that long hours spent in social

media doesn't generally take time away from physical

activity, which contradicts the popular notion that

active lifestyle is taken for granted due to too much

exposure to the internet or social media.

Table 2: Correlation between Social Media Use and

Physical Activity.

Variable Spearman

rho

Internet

Use- Hrs/

Day

Internet

Use- Day

/Month PA

Internet Use-

Hrs/Day

Correlation

Coefficien

1 -.199 .256

Sig. (2-

tailed)

.134 .053

Internet Use-

Day/Month

Correlation

Coefficien

-.199 1 -.114

Sig. (2-

tailed)

.134 .393

PA Correlation

Coefficien

.256 -.114 1

Sig. (2-

tailed)

.053 .393

4 CONCLUSION

This study found out that majority of the students who

participated in the study belongs to the sedentary

2.000

4.000

6.000

8.000

10.000

12.000

1 5 9 131721252933374145495357

ICSSHPE 2017 - 2nd International Conference on Sports Science, Health and Physical Education

372

walking activity level. It was indicated that the

participants had very high internet use in terms of

hours per day and moderately high social media use

in terms of days per month. Moreover, data revealed

that the students’ social media use was not associated

with physical activity participation. This means that

the extent of social media use was not a determining

factor on the students’ participation level in physical

activity. Although it is a relief to know that physical

activity participation was not related to the social

media use of students, it is alarming to know that

majority of the respondents belong to the sedentary

lifestyle level. This finding emphasizes the need for

the physical educators to intervene and promote an

active lifestyle. Likewise, students should also be

educated on how to manage their social media use

because of possible other detrimental effects.

Through the process of teaching, physical educators

should employ various strategies that encourage a

physically active lifestyle.

More research is needed on walking as a physical

activity so that factors that affect walking activity

level can be thoroughly explored. Likewise, future

research may look into intervention strategy that

would increase physical activity with the use of social

media since the participants have a very high extent

of usage in terms of hours per day. It is recommended

that college students increase their walking activity in

order to maintain an active lifestyle.

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