Use of Social Media

Only 9 of the 184 respondents say they don't use social media. The pervasiveness of social media runs through all subsets of the group: control and treatment group, male and female, and throughout all age groups, the use of social media hovers around 95% for all.

By far, the most commonly used social media are messenger apps and Facebook. Together they make up two thirds of all answers to the question "Which social media do you use?" With multiple answers possible, both messenger apps and Facebook were mentioned about 150 times -- meaning over 80% all respondents use them. Twitter, Instagram and IMO are other social media sites mentioned by a considerable group of respondents (30 or more).

Again, there are no salient distinctions between different subgroups on this topic, with perhaps the exception that the dominance of messenger apps and Facebook is slightly higher among women: accounting for 71.6% of all social media mentioned, versus 67.1% for men.

Over 150 respondents could name (multiple) people they know that use social media. Friends, neighbors or family members were mentioned most often.

Social sites visited since the last interview

Respondents were also asked which social media they had visited in between interview 1 (early March 2016) and interview 2 (early April 2016). The social media mentioned correlate with the answers given previously on the more general question which social media they use: some 35% mentioned Messenger apps, another 35% Facebook.

The absolute number of respondents answering this questions was lower however: while around 150 respondents said they use social media like Messenger apps and Facebook, around 120 respondents confirmed that they had used them in the past month. Using these numbers leads to a rough estimate that 80% of the respondents use social media on (at least) a monthly basis. Comparing by gender hints that the percentage of female monthly social media users is higher (~86%) compared to male monthly social media users (~78%).

Financial services on social media

A small minority of the respondents use social media for financial services. They were asked several question about their specific social media use. A considerable minority (47 respondents) indicated they do use social media to manage their business. The majority of this group gets their main source of income from casual work or self-employment. 

A smaller group also uses social media to manage their money: 18 respondents. There is considerable overlap between the groups managing their business and managing their money: eleven respondents indicated they used social media for both. 

Only one respondent said they had ever used social media to send or receive money.

Appreciation of Social Media

Positive effects

Of the 184 respondents, 154 could name one or more positive effects social media has on their lives. Only 8 said social media did not have any positive effects on their lives, while another 22 respondents could not answer the question.

The answers describing positive effects were coded and grouped under several indicators. By far the most often named positive effect of social media is that it connects people (63 respondents). A close second is that it gives the respondent access to information (48 respondents). Another 25 respondents say social media affect them positively as it lets them communicate with friends. Only a small group, 9 respondents, indicate that social media has a positive effect on their work (finding) efforts. A slightly bigger group of 14 respondents value social media as a tool for entertainment. 

Negative effects

Opinions on the negative effects of social media were more outspoken that those on the positive effects: the group of non-responders was only half as big as that for the question on positive effects (11 respondents). The group of respondents that specifically said social media did not have any negative effects for them was considerably bigger than the equivalent group for the question on positive effects: 31 respondents.

The remaining 142 respondents could name various negative effects social media has on their life. These answers were coded and grouped. The biggest issues respondents have with social media is that using it is expensive and it takes up a lot of their time. The cost of using social media, of course, comes from the use of data on smartphones or other devices (not from the use of social media itself). A considerable group (38 respondents) have some type of criticism on social media that relates to the social mores on these networks: nude pictures, spreading false information, rudeness -- all things that turn them off and are interpreted as negative effects on their lives. While both sexes mention these type of answers, more men than women do (21 men versus 17 women) Finally, a modest group say social media is addictive (17 respondents).

Learning

Asking for help

A majority of respondents has asked for help with their social activity, at least once. When asked to relate a story about such a time, 34 of the 184 respondents did not have an answer. The remaining 150 respondents gave various examples. The vast majority indicated they had asked a friend for help (97 respondents). Another 26 respondents would go to family members for help.