THE INFLUENCE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ON THE MORAL BEHAVIOURS OF SECONDARY SCHOOL
ABSTRACT
The study looked at the impact of information and communication technology (ICT) on the moral behaviors of adolescents in secondary schools in Lagos State’s Oshodi Local Government Area. A relevant and extensive literature review was also conducted in this study under some subheadings.
In this study, three null hypotheses were developed and tested, and the data was analyzed using the independent t-test statistical tool at the 0.05 level of significance. The descriptive research survey design was used to assess respondents’ opinions using the questionnaire titled “Influence of Information Communication Technology (ICT) on Moral Behavior of Adolescence,” and stratified random sampling was used to select the sample.
In addition, a total of 200 (two hundred) respondents were chosen and used as representatives of the study’s entire population. The following results were obtained at the conclusion of the data analysis: ICT has a significant impact on students’ moral behavior in school. Due to the use of ICT in school, there is a significant gender difference in delinquent behavior among students.
The use of ICT and adolescent social adjustment in school have a significant relationship. Among the recommendations made was that the use of ICT be included in the school curriculum at both the lower and upper levels of the Nigerian school system. This will help to improve teaching and learning in the school.
Students should maximize the benefits of ICT by not allowing the use of ICT, whether through phones, newspapers, magazines, or the internet, to sway their moral rectitude at school or at home.
It is obvious that using ICT via the internet to watch pornographic films, strange videos, and other electronic media influences students’ behavior in general. Having said that, students should not allow themselves to be involved in immoral acts as a result of the use of ICT.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1The Study’s Background
Nigeria has since embraced the use of information and communication technology (ICT) in the storage, processing, and retrieval of critical information. Nigeria has also been identified as a country that aspires to be included in the community of nations, as one that has adapted to the e-world, where ICT is the in-thing.
In Nigeria, for example, information and communication technology is used in educational, political, economic, and religious settings. It has infiltrated Nigeria so thoroughly that anyone who is not computer literate is now considered uneducated (Nwafor, 2005). The preceding opinion summarizes the essence and impact of ICT on Nigerians’ and Nigeria’s overall activities.
It is worth noting that moral decadence has been on the rise since the advent of information and communication technology (ICT) (Anyanwu, 2000). This is because most crimes in today’s society are associated with the use or contact with gadgets associated with information technology such as the phone, the internet, the television, and so on.
The term “information” refers to a wide range and variety of things, including oral and written words, figures, statements, files, and documents, as well as intangible elements such as sounds, signals, rays, and waves. The essence of information, whatever form it takes, is that it conveys a message.
UNESCO (1979) defined information as a “set of data recorded in a methodical manner,” which includes any item of knowledge capable of facilitating the operation of a system and any numerical or alpha-numerical quantity processed by the machine, according to the document. The data and results of a problem are comprised of the aggregate of information.
The term ‘technology,’ according to Ajaiyi (2004), refers to the application of scientific knowledge. Information technology is defined as the acquisition, processing, storage, and dissemination of vocal, pictorial, textual, and numerical information through the use of a macro-base combination of computing and telecommunication.
Telecommunication is a type of communication in which data is transmitted over long distances. Information technology also refers to a more efficient method of storing, accessing, and updating information than the paper-based process.
The way an organism, a machine, or any substance acts or works is referred to as its behavior. In the case of humans, there are two types of behavior: private and overt. The private is defined by a person’s behavior in his or her environment, whereas the overt, while related to the private,
is visible to others in the person’s environment. Behavior is a cooperative action between a person’s internal equipment and the nature of the environment in which the person lives. If the environmental stimulation is sufficiently strong, the organism’s internal equipment responds in a predictable pattern. Habits are formed as a result of repetition (Allports, 2005).
According to Pitty (2000), a person’s behavior is judged desirable or undesirable in a social context. What is desirable in one social situation may be unappealing in another. The relationship between antecedent conditions and subsequent events is what determines whether something is desirable or undesirable.
The antecedent conditions are events in a person’s social environment, while the subsequent events are the outcomes of these events, which may be appreciated or despised.
Environmental events take time to have an impact on an individual. In other words, environmental effects are cumulative and long-lasting. According to Uzor (2001), an individual’s current behavior manifestations may be functionally related to events that occurred in that individual’s life prior to those manifestations.
According to Ekpo (2002), information received by students via computer, television, and telephone can change or modify behavior. The information can generate new responses or change old ones, depending on the degree of observation allowed to the socializing individual and the type of imitation he/she can have of the behaviors and attitudes displayed by his models.
Despite the fact that the forces of development are primarily within the individual. In a natural environment free of corruption, the environment plays a secondary role in the process of natural enfoldment of that which nature has enfolded within the individual. Individuals will develop positively and rationally if the information is positive and conducive; otherwise, the development may be detrimental (Ajumel and Almonde, 2003).
According to Adams (2004), the interactionist position of individuals with the type, quantity, and quality of information received better explains the concept of individual differences in a culture, system, or organization that has a tendency to mold the people.
Socialization refers to the training given to children to help them meet the demands of the society in which they live. Information technology can help students with the following tasks: getting along with others (respecting others’ rights); self-reliance or self-confidence; academic success; material success; professional success; and adhering to a societal value system.
Morals are concerned with behavioral standards, which are the fundamental principles that guide people in determining what is right or wrong, and thus what is good or bad. That is, morals direct people in the right direction and enable society to value and preserve fundamental virtues such as love, honesty, self-control, modesty, chastity, truthfulness, discipline, and so on.
Simultaneously, morals govern people’s welfare and sharpen their attitudes toward things like cheating in exams or corrupt practices in society, selfishness, dishonesty, greed, theft, robbery, fornication or adultery, and so on (Adekoya, 2002).
Adekoya believes that the use of ICT in schools by adolescents has caused some of them to perform poorly in their exams. What can one expect from a student who does not read or study well because he spends so much time watching television shows, watching or viewing pornographic films on the internet, and busy posting letters to friends on Facebook or YouTube, according to him?
Not only has the use of ICT caused them to achieve low or dismal academic performance, but it has also caused some adolescents to be recluses, i.e. keeping to themselves in order to have time to watch bad movies on the internet. This has had an impact on their social adjustment with peers in society or at home.
According to Uzor (2006), the use of ICT has caused male and female students to become promiscuous as a result of the negative influence it has created in them. This is due to the fact that adolescents mimic what they see and hear on television, the internet, and other media.
Adolescents in schools nowadays use telephones, the internet, and other forms of (ICT) to gather information that helps them carry out their educational pursuits effectively, thanks to the advancement of information communications technology.
Nonetheless, adolescent use of ICT has resulted in a slew of societal ills. For example, many students use their phones to tell lies, and many of them corrupt their minds by visiting pornographic websites and viewing corruptive and strange images. They become corrupt, promiscuous, dishonest, and immoral as a result of this medium (Bello, 2008). This study seeks to determine the extent to which ICT influences the morality of individuals, particularly students in our various secondary schools.
1.2Statement of the Issues
The purpose of this research is to determine whether or not the use of ICT by adolescents in school has affected their moral and ethical behaviors at home and at school, and whether or not the Nigerian school system and society have fared well since the introduction of ICT.
There is no denying that, since the advent of telephones, the internet, Facebook, and YouTube, society and schools have experienced their fair share of the ills associated with ICT. For example, the advent of ICT has led to some Nigerian youths in schools imbibing the culture of lying, stealing electronically (i.e. the famous yahoo-yahoo) that is
currently popular, and cheating at examinations and tests. Others have had their minds corrupted by viewing strange or pornographic images on the internet. As a result, some Nigerian youths or adolescents in schools have become corrupt, promiscuous, and immoral in their behavior or attitudes.
Not only that, but the use of ICT by children may have caused many of them to become deviants, obtaining by trickery (OBT), prostitutes, bullies, and disrespectful to authority figures in society and school. All of this is a result of what they hear, learn, and see as a result of the use of ICT materials that have infiltrated the entire world today.
The aforementioned issues prompted the study of ICT and adolescent moral behavior in schools.
1.3The Study’s Purpose
The primary goals of this research are as follows:
(1) Determine whether ICT influences students’ moral behavior.
(2) Determine whether there is a link between ICT and student academic performance.
(3) Determine whether there is a gender difference in student delinquent behavior as a result of the use of information and communication technology.
(4) Determine whether there is a link between the use of ICT and adolescents’ social adjustment in school.
1.4Research Issues
The following research questions have been posed:
(1) Will the use of ICT affect students’ moral behavior?
(2) Is there a link between students’ academic performance and their use of ICT?
(3) Will there be significant gender differences in student delinquent behavior as a result of ICT use?
(4) Is there a link between the use of ICT and adolescents’ social adjustment at school?
1.5Analysis of Research Hypotheses
In this study, the following hypotheses were developed:
(1) Information and communication technology will have no significant impact on students’ moral behavior.
(2) There will be no statistically significant relationship between ICT use and students’ academic performance in school.
(3) There will be no significant gender differences in student delinquent behavior as a result of the use of ICT in the classroom.
(4) There will be no significant relationship between the use of ICT and the social adjustment of adolescents in school.
1.6The Study’s Importance
The following people will benefit from this research:
Teachers: The recommendations and findings of this study would benefit teachers in our various institutions – primary, secondary, and tertiary. This is because the study’s findings and recommendations would go a long way toward informing teachers about the influences of ICT on the moral and religious behavior of adolescents in schools, particularly at the secondary school level.
Students: Would benefit greatly from this study because it will serve as a wake-up call for them. Without a doubt, the use of ICT is critical to the academic careers of adolescents, but the dangers inherent in the use of ICT cannot be overstated.
As a result, the purpose of this study is to bridge the gap between the use of ICT and the immorality associated with it among youths in schools. This research will assist students in developing an interest in the use and application of various information and communication technologies in the storage and retrieval of critical information regarding academic performance and educational careers.
The School Authority will benefit from this study as well, because it will help them understand how to proceed in resolving the problem(s) caused by students’ use of ICT and its impact on the overall well-being of the school system.
Parents: The findings and conclusions of this study will provide them with necessary or vital information because they will help them understand the use and importance of information and communication technology to their children and wards.
Society: The findings and conclusions of this study will have a significant impact on society. For example, this study will be eye-opening for members of the larger society in that it will inform them about the use of information and communication technology by students and others at school and in society.
1.7Scope of the Research
The study looked at the impact of ICT on adolescents’ moral behaviors in some selected secondary schools in Lagos State’s Oshodi Government Area.
1.8Terms Definition
In this study, operational terms were defined in this manner.
In this study, technology refers to tools and machines that can be used to solve real-world problems. It also refers to material objects of human use, such as machines, hardware, software, systems, organizational methods, and techniques. In this context, technology is defined as the techniques used by individuals in school or society to keep up with new discoveries in the world.
The term “innovation” is used in the study to describe both radical and incremental changes to ICT products and processes. In the organizational context, innovation is linked to improved efficiency, productivity, quality, competitive positioning, market share, and so on.
ICT (Information Communication Technology): ICT is an abbreviation for Information Communication Technology, which encompasses all electronic technologies and equipment used to facilitate information processing and communication.
Moral Behaviour: This is a term used to describe an individual’s right behavior or attitudes in a given community. In a decent society, it is the upholding of ethics, values, and norms. Moral behavior is defined in this study as the way and manner in which an individual carries himself or herself, based primarily on one’s religious beliefs.
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