Social media use and college students’ academic performance: Student engagement as a mediator

We investigated the relationships between students’ social media use, engagement, and academic performance, proposing that student engagement would mediate the social media use–academic performance relationship. Using survey data from 307 Chinese college students, we found that student engagement played a mediating role in the link between social media use and academic performance. In addition, the results show that the direct effect of social media use by college students on their academic performance was nonsignificant. Our results contribute to knowledge of the relationships between social media use, student engagement, and academic performance in a Chinese higher educational context. They also provide educators with meaningful implications for improving students’ academic performance. Future directions for research are discussed.