Generation Y Students in Social Media: What Do We Know about Them?

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to estimate what we know about Generation Y students’ behavior in Social Media (SM), especially in our country. The correct identification of their traits is crucial for the academic community, primarily from the perspective of understanding their real needs, as beneficiaries of teaching act, followed by a serious and consistent adaptation of our offer. In an extended literature review, we try to determine the reasons for SM use, their preferences for one medium or another, the way, place and time of SM use, and the Romanian particularities in the general personality portrait observed and explained by literature. We discuss the advantages and
disadvantages of their intensive SM use, show how the time spent in SM affect the individuals and the universities, and try to find out what their needs and expectancies are. In our opinion, the problems treated here are of interest both for professors as individuals, and for the universities’ and faculties’ management – especially in a world in which the borderline between the physical and virtual life is becoming more and more difficult to draw.