Exclusive Survey: 7awi Results On Social Media Usage

With the lockdown measures implemented this year and the new norm of working remotely, we at 7awi were intrigued about the usage of social media and wanted to find our what the numbers looked like this year. Hence we conducted a survey to find out the results ourselves.

The survey aims to examine the influence of social media sites on their users and their daily life. It covered over 3,000 participants from the Middle East and North Africa.

According to the online poll, 91.6% of participants use their mobile phones to access their social media accounts, with 21.5% post on social media at least once a week, and 21.2% post daily.

What is more, 39.3% spend over 3 hours a day on various social media sites. According to the survey, Facebook ranked first as the most popular social media platform for 44.4% of the participants, followed by WhatsApp, the instant messaging application, with 30.4%.

The poll results demonstrate that 57.2% of the voters use social media for personal reasons, while 81.5% use it to connect with friends and family, and only 20.6% to search for new friends.

More so, 41.2% said they use social media for both personal and commercial use. The results show that 43.7% of participants rely on social media to complete their work, whereas 20.6% look for new job opportunities on social media.

In addition, 52.5% of the participants reported they only access social media platforms in their spare time, while 43.6% said they are connected most of the time, and 22.1% are keen on checking their social media before bed.

For of the participants, they use social media sites to watch video clips. More so, the survey found that entertainment and celebrities are the most popular content on Facebook (for 69.2% of participants), Instagram (for 76.4%), Snapchat (54.6%), YouTube (54.6%) and TikTok (80.3%).

The survey found that 37.9% of participants have over 500 friends on all their social media accounts. But, only 35.5% of them have actually met the majority of these friends.

Furthermore, 82.5% said they use social media accounts to sign into other sites, and 57.3% said that Facebook is the most popular social media account for logging into other websites.

The participants pointed out the negative effects of using social media on both people and users, some of these effects include:

• Spreading fake news and rumors. (92.2% of participants believe that social media platforms facilitate the spread of fake news).
• Social media can be used to manipulate people by using fake names and photos, and conduct deception and fraud. (48.3% think that celebrities and influencers would promote certain products on social media, hence affecting their decision about buying these products).
• Addiction. (40% of participants believe themselves to be addicted to social media).

Nonetheless, the participants find that social media have a number of advantages, some of which are:

• Connecting with people at any time regardless of their geographic location. (81.5% use social media to communicate with family and friends).
• Staying updated about the latest news around the world. (73.5% use social media outlets to learn about the latest news).
• Meet new people and create friendships. (20.6% use social media to make new friends).

To read the full survey results, click here.

Lead image courtesy of unsplash