Facebook, Twitter use doesn't keep students up at night

While a study last year found use of Facebook has led to lower grades among college students, a survey of University of New Hampshire students released this week concluded that the popular social network is not keeping them up at night.

The survey of 1,247 UNH students found that those who use Facebook, Twitter and other social networks for 61 or more minutes a day are equally as likely as those who use social networks for 31 or fewer minutes per day to sleep seven or fewer hours per night.

“The study indicates that using social media is hardly what keeps students up at night,” said UNH adjunct professor Chuck Martin, whose class conducted the study. “Using Facebook, and to a lesser degree YouTube, blogs or Twitter, do not appear to have any impact on how much or how little students sleep.”

This UNH study comes several months after a similar study conducted at Ohio State University concluded that college students who use Facebook spend less time studying and have lower grades than students who don't use the popular social networking site.

The UNH study found that 97% of the students surveyed use Facebook. At the other end of the spectrum, only 10% actively use LinkedIn social network for business people.