The influence of Facebook on interpersonal communication

ABSTRACT: Today, with the development of communication technologies, social network sites become common and popular. People prefer to communicate with each other via social network sites. In particular, Facebook is used by almost everyone and today it has about 901 million users from all around the world. Therefore, the aim of this study is to explore the influence of Facebook on interpersonal communication among 200 students who study at the Faculty of Communication and Media Studies at the Eastern Mediterranean University in the academic year 2012-2013, spring semester. For the completion of the present study, data has been collected through a questionnaire which consists of 66 questions. 37 of these questions are demographic and related to user habits. 29 of them are designed according to a 5 point Likert scale and sought to measure the students’ attitudes towards the use of Facebook, and the effects of Facebook on inter-personal communication. The findings of the study indicate that participants do not feel the need to engage in face to face communication when they use Facebook. Although this is the case, the results of the current study also suggest that face to face communication habits are still not vanished. Keywords: Facebook, Interpersonal Communication, Socialization and Loneliness …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………