The effects of social media on political participation behavior of university students

Politics in the broadest definition is the collection of activities to establish, protect and change the general rules that manage people's lives. As being involved in politics is an indispensable concept, participation of the individual in politics arises in this coming across. Individuals are starting to use social media and internet technologies, which they adopted in almost every aspect of their lives, in politics, too. Therefore, it is assumed that they show high rates of involvement in online political behavior. The general purpose of this study is to determine the political behaviors of university students on social media and describe the perceptions towards these behaviors, as well as new behavior types. The study is designed as a survey model. In the course of research, a literature review was conducted and a conceptual frame was presented. In the following stages of the study, a scale of two parts on the opinions of students of Anadolu University was implemented in accordance with the purpose and design of the study. The first part of the scale contains personal information of the participants. There are 46 statements in the second part regarding the determined dimensions of online political participation. Online political behaviors were determined by brainstorming in two groups, one for researchers and one for students. In the scope of the study, 406 individuals among Anadolu University students were reached and their opinions on participation were analyzed. Being an average university, as it represents the average of Turkish population in many aspects, Anadolu University was seen suitable to reflect the characteristics of Turkish university students. As statistical method, t-test, ANOVA and chi-squared tests were utilized in analyzing the results of the study, and frequency distributions were used to describe the data. The results of the study presented information in accordance with one of the theories on the political usage of social media, "reinforcement theory." According to the results, participants do not perform intensive political activities on social media. Almost all of the behaviors are performed in low intensity. Social media are used for political reasons by people who are more politically inclined that describe themselves as cyber-activists. The more crowded remaining people resort to political behavior on social media instantaneously. These resorted behaviors generally emerge as acts based on sharing and communication, that is, acts that require low amounts of effort. Again, according to the results, university students reach political news via social media, spend a lot of time on social media and they think filters, internet connection prices and data recording are obstacles for political behaviors. Key Words: Political participation, activism, cyberactivism, social media, internet.