Journal of Communication, June 2001

Journal of Communication, June 2001

366

Internet Use and Collegiate Academic

Performance Decrements: Early Findings

By Robert W. Kubey, Michael J. Lavin, and John R. Barrows

Recent research at colleges and universities has suggested that some college stu-dents’

academic performance might be impaired by heavier use of the Internet.

This study reviews the relevant literature and presents data from a survey of 572

students at a large public university. Heavier recreational Internet use was shown

to be correlated highly with impaired academic performance. Loneliness, staying

up late, tiredness, and missing class were also intercorrelated with self-reports of

Internet-caused impairment. Self-reported Internet dependency and impaired aca-demic

performance were both associated with greater use of all Internet applica-tions,

but particularly with much greater use of synchronous communication ap-plications

such as chat rooms and MUDs, as opposed to asynchronous applications

such as email and Usenet newsgroups.

Use of the Internet as a resource for education enjoys near-universal support from

students, parents, educators, and institutions, including the United States govern-ment.

As former Vice President Albert Gore has said, “We have made progress in

reaching our goal of connecting all of the nation’s schools and classrooms to the

Internet by the year 2000” (Gore, 1998). One online survey reports that 68% of

parents, 69% of students, and 69% of teachers said that they have personally seen

students’ grades improve through use of the Internet (AT&T, 1998). However,

although use of the Internet by students is on the rise, so are concerns that for some

students, heavier use of the Internet might interfere with academic achievement,

conventional social interaction, and exposure to desirable cultural experiences.

The issue has come up increasingly on scores of college campuses, but no-where

more publically than at William Woods University in Fulton, Missouri. In

May of 2000 the 1,400-student university announced to the world that it had

instituted a new program wherein undergraduate students will earn $5,000 each

year against the school’s $13,000 tuition as long as they scored enough points

attending various designated cultural events on campus. The program was de-Robert

Kubey is director of the Center for Media Studies and associate professor of journalism and

media studies at Rutgers University, Michael Lavin is a professor of psychology at St. Bonaventure

University, and John Barrows is director of communication for RCI. The authors wish to thank a

number of students who helped with data collection, coding, and input, especially Barna Donovan,

Hyo Kim, and Shirin Zarqa.