PERCEIVED EFFECTS OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON PSYCHOSOCIAL WELLBEING AMONG YOUTH IN ANGLICAN CHURCH OF KENYA IN EMBU DIOCESE OF EMBU WEST, KENYA

Abstract

Youths whether in church or outside get so much involved in use of technology especially social media during lockdown of churches. Social media may affect their relationship with others especially chats from peers. Social media take on many forms including blogs, business/social networks, forums, photo/video sharing, social bookmarking, social gaming. This paper established the effects of social media on psychosocial wellbeing of youth in Anglican Church of Kenya Embu Diocese, particularly how it affected their interpersonal relationships and mental processes. It used a descriptive survey of youth in 5 ACK churches with 1200 youth. Random sampling technique was used to select 291 youth from the population. Purposive sampling was used to select 9 clergy, who represented the 5 ACK churches, making a total of 300. The study used 300 respondents which represented both youth and clergy. Data was collected using questionnaires for the youth and interview schedule for the clergy. The piloting to 10 youth was done to help remove the errors. Cronbach Alpha Coefficient was used to test for reliability for youth’s questionnaires. The reliability coefficient was α= 0.8 and was deemed appropriate since it was above the recommended 0.7. The Interview was conducted among the selected 90 Clergy. Descriptive statistics were used to present data. Qualitative data was obtained from open-ended thematic questions for clergy. Data analysis was done using Statistical Package for Social Science version 21. Social media affected the social interactions of the youth in that as they chat their friends criticized them and bullied them hence lowering their self-esteem and the more they used it the more they got fatigue and exhaustion hence causing burnout but proper use of it enhanced interpersonal relationships. The findings will help enlighten the youth on how best to use social media, especially in church during the COVD-19 pandemic. They would encourage churches to enlighten youth through seminars on how to use social media responsibly to mitigate the pandemic. The study recommends introduction of programmes to train the youth on how the social media can be of help to them if well used to enhance social interactions and mental wellbeing. Keywords: Psychosocial, Burn-out, Interpersonal relationships, COVID-19