FALCULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

This study examined the effect of social media on the academic performance of undergraduate students at the University of Benin. The increasing use of social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and X has significantly influenced students' academic and social lives, creating both opportunities for learning and challenges related to distraction and excessive usage. The study sought to determine the purposes for which students use social media, examine its relationship with academic performance, identify any gender differences in usage, and explore ways of reducing social media addiction among students. A descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study. Data were collected through the use of structured questionnaires administered to 100 undergraduate students selected through simple random sampling. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, including frequencies and percentages.The findings revealed that WhatsApp is the most frequently used social media platform among students. It was also found that while some students use social media for academic purposes, the majority use it mainly for entertainment and communication. The study also demonstrated the detrimental effects of excessive social media use on students' focus, study habits, and general academic achievement. However, social media can improve students' academic performance when utilized sensibly for learning, knowledge sharing, and academic cooperation. According to the study's findings, students' academic performance can be impacted by social media in both positive and negative ways, depending on their usage habits and goals. As a result, it advised students to prioritize their academic work, use social media more for learning, and manage their time well. To encourage improved academic results, universities can also host awareness campaigns about safe social media use.

The broad objective of this study is to examine the effect of fiscal policy and aggregate economic activities on economic growth in Nigeria. To achieve the purpose of this study four hypothesis were formulated to guide the study, literature review was carried out on the variables and hypothesis of the study. A dynamic equation is specified to describe the relationship between the dependent variable RGDP and the independent variable GDP = f(Tax, HDC, GINV, TRN, SAVS). the study examined fiscal policy, aggregate economic activities and economic growth in Nigeria utilizing annual time series data for the period of 1981 to 2021. This research employed the following methods for analysis: Descriptive Statistics, Unit Root test, Co-Integration test, granger causality test and vector autoregressive technique of estimation. Based on the results of empirical analysis, it can be ascertained that there is sufficient evidence to indicate that fiscal policy, aggregate economic activities have long run relationship with economic growth in Nigeria as the trace statistics and max Eigen value test indicate a case of co-integration among the variables. However, according to the VECM result fiscal policy is not significant in influencing economic in the short run while in the long run it significantly influences economic growth. Consumption both first and second period lags significantly influences economic growth in Nigeria while investment seems not influence economic growth in Nigeria. Thus, it can be concluded, that fiscal policy and consumption drives economic growth in Nigeria while investment does not