Influence of social media language on the academic writings of students of senior high school a case study of Swedru School of Business

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of social media language on academic writings of students of Swedru School of Business. It sought to find out if students‟ use of social media language had transcended into their academic writings and what opinions are about permitting the social media language in academic writing. The research drew inspiration from the Bandura‟s Social Learning theory (1997) and Corder‟s Error Analysis Theory (1974). Corder‟s Error Analysis Theory (1974) was employed. Data was collected through the use of two questionnaires, one for teachers and one for students. Also, students‟ deviations or errors were collected from their compositions. Data was analyzed qualitatively using the mean and standard deviation values represented in pie charts, bar charts and lines respectively. The findings revealed that though the use of social media language is prevalent among senior high school students on social media, it has not transcended into their academic writings. It therefore had no influence on students‟ writings. Though the students committed grammatical, spelling and sentence construction errors, those could not be attributed to their use of social media language. The research concluded that the use of social media language does not pose a major threat to students‟ formal writings. The researcher recommends that teachers should create opportunities for students to write more essays, so as to help them overcome their identified errors