729 © 2019 Annals of Medical and Health Sciences Research Original Article Research Article Introduction Social media usage has become a part of everyday life for most young people the world over in the 21st century. [1] It is currently one of the most popular leisure activities among young people. Social media provides a platform for interactions among people in which they create, share, and exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks [2,3] in ways that only a few years earlier seemed unthinkable to even the most advanced scientists. Yet now it has more infuence on our lives than we could possibly imagine. Social media provides us with a forecast in ten seconds or less, internet banking, and most importantly, social media such as Facebook, Instagram, twitter etc., has taken the technology world to a new level through social networking. [4] Social networking is an internet based application; its usage begins with the creation of a unique account or profle which links people or organizations to share knowledge with others within the site across several countries. Example of social networks includes Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp, 2go, Viber, WeChat, and many others. [4] Over the years, social networkers have increased from a few thousands to billions of users. Higher institutions have also appreciated the importance of social networking and were also involved in disclosing information about online social networking involvement to their students. [1] Social networks today are being used by teachers, lecturers and students as communication tool. [5] However the growth and popularity of social networking sites coupled with their addiction by its How to Cite this Article: SOche OM, et al. Prevalence and Effect of Social Media on Sleep among Students of Higher Institutions in Sokoto Metropolis, Sokoto State Nigeria. Ann Med Health Sci Res. 2019;9:729-735. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Com‑ mons Attribution‑NonCommercial‑ShareAlike 3.0 License, which allows others to remix, tweak, and build upon the work non‑commercially, as long as the author is credited and the new creations are licensed under the identical terms. usage is a growing problem among young people and students in general. [6] In Nigeria, the number of social network users is on the rise. The long hours used for social networking causes problems for students ranging from altered sleep pattern, lack of concentration and poor academic performance. [7] Facebook users in the UK cumulatively spend a week on the average each year on social media sites whilst in bed thereby increasing the risk of suffering from a sleep disorder such as insomnia. [8] Another study conducted among university students showed that up to 95% of respondents use social media every night before going to sleep. [1] Social media is a convenient method of communication providing the user the ability to stay connected with friends and family at the discretion of the users’ own rate and time. [9] Social media are highly effcient because they are one of many methods of communication that allow users to quickly and widely disseminate information. Duggan and Brenner observed that 83% of 18-29 year olds disseminate information via social networking sites. [10] Research has shown that exposure to bright light from computer Prevalence and Efect of Social Media on Sleep among Students of Higher Insttutons in Sokoto Metropolis, Sokoto State Nigeria Oche Mansur Oche*, Godwin Jiya Gana, Musa Yahaya, Ibrahim Khalid and Maryam Ladan Abdulrahman Sambo Department of Community Health, Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, Nigeria Abstract Background: Social media use is a very popular leisure activity that is common amongst young people globally. There is increasing evidence that students spend several hours daily on social media with afectation of sleep duration. Sleep duration of 7 to 9 hours daily is needed for normal healthy function of the human body. This study was conducted to determine the efect of social media on sleep patern among students of higher institutions in Sokoto metropolis, Sokoto State. Methods: This was a cross sectional descriptive study carried out among 381 students of higher institutions in Sokoto metropolis using multistage sampling technique. Frequencies of the various variables were tabulated and chi-square tests were done as appropriate. Results: About 67.4% of the respondents were within the age group 20-24 years. A total of 97.9% of the respondents used social media with WhatsApp ((84.9%) and Facebook ((81.7%) being the commonly used platforms. More than a quarter ((27.4%) used social media for more than 3 hours in a day. About 92% of the respondents used social media at night. Almost half of the respondents who used social media at night have their sleep duration afected by its use. Those using it for more than 2 hours at night were 5 times more likely to have sleep afectation ((AOR=2.9 – 7.3, p<0.000). Conclusion: The study demonstrated high prevalence of social media use amongst students of higher institutions in Sokoto with a signifcant proportion of them having sleep duration shortened. Schools and the general public should be made to create awareness on the negative impact of using social media among students especially at night. Keywords: Social media; Social network sites; Students; Sleep; Higher institutions Corresponding author: Oche Mansur Oche, Department of Community Health, Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, Nigeria, Tel: +2348-35045144; E-mail: ochedr@hotmail.com