Effect of Social Networking Addiction on Memory Functioning and Aggression Among University Students: Mediating Role of Sleep Quality

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between social networking addiction on memory functioning and aggression among university students. Aim is to know how social networking addiction has affected university students' memory and elevates aggression level. It determines about university students social networking addiction is mediated by their quality of sleep. The age, gender, education, family type and marital status affect social networking addiction. The sample was comprised of (N=405) university students among them (n=203) were Male and (n=202) were Females having age criteria of 18 to 27 years, undergraduate bachelor level students. Data was collected from different universities of Islamabad, Lahore, Peshawar, Haripur and Rawalpindi. In this research four scales are used to measure four variables i.e., SNS (Social Networking Addiction Scale) (Griffiths, 2005), Buss-Perry Aggression Questionnaire (Buss & Perry, 1992), MMQ (Multifactorial Memory Functioning Scale) (Troyer & Rich, 2002) and SQS (Sleep Quality Scale) (Yi et al., 2006). Results of this study revealed that social networking addiction causes lower memory functioning and higher aggression, there is negative correlation between poor sleep quality and memory functioning and positive correlation between poor sleep quality and aggression. The other significant finding is that male and female university students are almost equally addicted to social networking addiction. Unlike previous researches it has been founded that rate of aggression is higher in females than males.