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Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes

Medical students use Facebook to interact with one another both socially and educationally. This study investigates how medical students in a UK medical school use Facebook to support their learning. In particular, it identifies the nature of their educational activities, and details their experienc...

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Autor principal: Ali, Anam
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Bohn Stafleu van Loghum 2016
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4908040/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27271571
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40037-016-0273-5
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author Ali, Anam
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author_sort Ali, Anam
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description Medical students use Facebook to interact with one another both socially and educationally. This study investigates how medical students in a UK medical school use Facebook to support their learning. In particular, it identifies the nature of their educational activities, and details their experiences of using an educational Facebook group. Twenty-four medical students who self-identified as being Facebook users were invited to focus groups to attain a general overview of Facebook use within an educational context. A textual analysis was then conducted on a small group of intercalating medical students who used a self-created Facebook group to supplement their learning. Five of these students participated in semi-structured interviews. Six common themes were generated. These included ‘collaborative learning’, ‘strategic uses for the preparation for assessment’, ‘sharing experiences and providing support’, ‘creating and maintaining connections’, ‘personal planning and practical organization’ and ‘sharing and evaluating educational resources’. Evidence from this study shows that medical students are using Facebook informally to enhance their learning and undergraduate lives. Facebook has enabled students to create a supportive learning community amongst their peers. Medical educators wishing to capitalize on Facebook, as a platform for formal educational initiatives, should remain cautious of intruding on this peer online learning community.
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spelling pubmed-49080402016-06-30 Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes Ali, Anam Perspect Med Educ Original Article Medical students use Facebook to interact with one another both socially and educationally. This study investigates how medical students in a UK medical school use Facebook to support their learning. In particular, it identifies the nature of their educational activities, and details their experiences of using an educational Facebook group. Twenty-four medical students who self-identified as being Facebook users were invited to focus groups to attain a general overview of Facebook use within an educational context. A textual analysis was then conducted on a small group of intercalating medical students who used a self-created Facebook group to supplement their learning. Five of these students participated in semi-structured interviews. Six common themes were generated. These included ‘collaborative learning’, ‘strategic uses for the preparation for assessment’, ‘sharing experiences and providing support’, ‘creating and maintaining connections’, ‘personal planning and practical organization’ and ‘sharing and evaluating educational resources’. Evidence from this study shows that medical students are using Facebook informally to enhance their learning and undergraduate lives. Facebook has enabled students to create a supportive learning community amongst their peers. Medical educators wishing to capitalize on Facebook, as a platform for formal educational initiatives, should remain cautious of intruding on this peer online learning community. Bohn Stafleu van Loghum 2016-06-06 2016-06 /pmc/articles/PMC4908040/ /pubmed/27271571 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40037-016-0273-5 Text en © The Author(s) 2016 Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
spellingShingle Original Article
Ali, Anam
Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes
title Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes
title_full Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes
title_fullStr Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes
title_full_unstemmed Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes
title_short Medical students’ use of Facebook for educational purposes
title_sort medical students’ use of facebook for educational purposes
topic Original Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4908040/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27271571
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40037-016-0273-5
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