Abstract
This is a project on the development of a scale that measures people’s attitudes towards Facebook. Attitude which is core in this case defines the consistence of an individual’s beliefs, feelings, and behavior towards certain social groups, objects as well as symbols.
The developed of the scale will be based on two test ; the Cronbachs Alpha test and the attitude- behavior correlation test. The Cronbachs Alpha test evaluates the internal reliability of the scale developed while the attitude-behavior correlation test evaluates validity of the scale.
The process was based on a reasonable sample size of 28 students who are well conversant with Facebook which is the core element in this process. A set of behaviors have been selected and divided into groups of five and seven to give the study a wider scope.
The questions have been structured in to questionnaires with each of the questionnaires holding unique questions on the behavior of the students on Facebook.
The scale is successfully developed with the Cronbachs Alpha indicating poor internal reliability of the scale. The reliability of this finding is enhanced through the indication of no attitude-behavioral correlation in the developed scale.
Discussion
Attitude may be defined as a consistent relationship between one’s belief, feeling, and behavior towards social objects, groups as well as symbols. This psychological affinity may be shown through evaluation of a given element in a degree of favor and disfavor towards the empathy (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993).
This project has developed an attitude scale that has been used to appraise the attitude of people towards Facebook in terms of their feeling, belief and behavior towards this social media. As per the second definition of attitude, determinant scale has been suggested as a method to tell whether an individual favors or disfavors Facebook as a social media. Based on these definitions one could conclude that use and behavior towards Facebook may define one’s attitude to Facebook which is not the case. Results indicate that most of the behaviors do not relate in any way to the attitudes of the individuals.
In the case of the assessment of the effectiveness of the attitude scale developed, two tests were conducted. The first one is Cronbachs Alpha which would evaluate internal reliability, while the second one focused on the attitude behavior correlations which inclined on the predictive validity. Reliability was to define the consistency of the instruments being used while validity evaluates the extent to which an instrument measures an element. These elements were extremely vital in determining the capability of the attitude scale that was being developed. The Cronbachs Alpha tool has been used in various tests and it is one of the most reliable tools in the determination of an attitude scale. Although, the tool indicated that there was poor internal reliability it cannot be ruled out as a poor tool of determination of attitude scale. It has given results based on the information that was available as well as the material that was used in the evaluation.
The attitude-behavior correlation was used to test the validity of the scale that was being developed. For the scale to be meaningful and bear the intended results critical comparison or analysis between these elements was supposed to be carried out.
The number of students used as sample is satisfactory since consisted of individuals who are well aware of Facebook and have used it at one point or the other. Their attitude
The researcher chose an extremely crucial path of weighing the relationship between attitudes and behavior of certain people towards Facebook through the development of a scale. The number of questions chosen in the research was seven. These questions were meant to prepare an ample platform of discussion and wide evaluation of how people feel towards certain elements of Facebook as a social networking site. Five behaviors towards Facebook were evaluated with each of them measured separate. The reason for measuring them differently was to identify the uniqueness of the attitude of people towards the variable. Having a wide range of variables in any research makes the findings or the results of the research more reliable and exhaustive.
Among the materials that were used in the research or in the development of the attitude scale is a set of two questionnaire scales. The first questionnaire had seven questions that were related to social networking. Each of these questions was supposed to be answered in the options; strongly disagree, disagree, neither agree nor disagree, agree, and strongly agree. The main aim of coming up with this kind of questions which are open-ended and yet confined to certain answers was to get an extremely wide range of answers. These answers were put in such a way that it was extremely difficult to obtain double answers which would be erroneous.
The second questionnaire which supposed to predict behavior on the basis of attitudes towards Facebook was made of a scale of five items. Likewise, this questionnaire focused on the main activities that people undertake in Facebook and how often they do it. This was significant in identifying what are the most common behaviors on Facebook and why people preferred certain activities. Questions will always bring out the intended picture of a behavior since an individual cannot hold on pretence for a long time.
The results of the initial correlation test indicated no significant correlation between attitudes towards Facebook and behavior. An example of the questions that were used here is how many times a day one checks his or her Facebook. This is a representative question which entails other extensive questions on the topic and how it is influenced by behavior. There could have been other factor that pushes an individual to update on Facebook but the times cannot determine the attitude of the individual towards Facebook. The issue of how often one updates was exhaustively covered but they all indicate that there was no relationship between the attitude towards Facebook and the times that one visits Facebook.
The use of Facebook for development activities like organization of events was also evaluated and it still indicated that there was no correlation between attitude and the social media. The research style that has been adopted in the development of this scale is satisfactory as a reliable research. All procedures and tools used are reliable. Therefore, it is right to conclude that there is no correlation between attitude and behavior towards Facebook based on the validity and reliability of the attitude scale that has been developed.
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