Exploring the potential benefits of facebook on personal, social, academic and career development for higher education students

Abstract

At present, Facebook is a free and one of the most popular social networking sites. Its primary purpose is to provide an online communication platform for users to make new friends and interact with them. It may be an ideal platform for online learning community with great potential to facilitate student guidance and counseling work. In this paper, we present findings from a small scale study exploring the potential benefits of Facebook on personal, social, academic and career development. Data were collected from interviews and messages written by the students on Facebook. The results indicated that both students and teachers would benefit from this new approach. The potential benefits of Facebook for students are not only limited to academic development but also in personal/social development and career development. © 2012 Springer-Verlag.