Psychosocial Effect of Social Media Use in Communicating “Oke Ite” Traditional Charm on Youths in Anambra State: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

The survey investigates psychosocial effect of social media use in communicating “oke ite” traditional charm on youths in Anambra state.  Social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, WhatsApp, YouTube, Instagram and among others, provide new ways to  ‘stimulate citizens’ engagement in cultural discuss. Traditional priest and priestess are becoming more active on it, thus, communicating  “oke ite” traditional charm via social media creates grassroot awareness about the charm. Specifically, the objectives of this study include  to; ascertain the respondent’s major sources of information about “oke ite” traditional charm, determine if social media  exposure increases the respondent’s knowledge about “oke ite” charm, find out if social media influences the respondent’s attitude  towards “oke ite” charm and to investigate if the respondent’s attitude will influence their adoption/practice of “oke ite” messages on  social media. The study was hinged on Technological Determinism and Theory of Reasoned Action. In-Depth Interview was used to  generate data for qualitative data and the result was used to answer the research question. Population of the study consists of the  population of youth’s leaders who are residence in Awka south Local government. This youth leaders were selected from nine towns in  Awka South LGA namely; Awka, Nibo, Amawobia, Okpuno, Nise, Umuawulu, Isiagu, Ezinato, and Mbaukwu. Two participants were  purposively selected from each quarter; thus, the sample size was 18 participants. Evidence from the research data indicated that  Facebook followed by WhatsApp was the respondent’s major source of information about “oke ite” charm, social media sites increase the  respondent’s knowledge about “oke ite” charm, though the respondents perceive social media sites very useful, but social media  exposure did not influence their attitude or lure them into practice of “oke ite” charm. The study concludes that though social media has  been found as a veritable tool for promoting cultural belief and practices, but, Nigerian government should formulate law/regulation that  will control the abuse of social media platforms by citizen journalist.