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Correlation between Time Spent on Electronic Devices (weekly) and School

Percentage.
Joshua Sabherwal

Abstract:
Using electronic devices often cause teens to get grumpy and annoyed, in addition to being
distracted and neglecting their school work. Often many teens chat for hours without
realizing that valuable study time (especially when examinations are around the corner) is
going to waste. This study would help better understand exactly how a students percentage
and use of electronic devices are related.

Introduction:
The purpose of this survey is to examine the impact of electronic devices on school
percentage of the students of Suncity school. Raw data regarding the same was collected
and analysed in order to make conclusions on the same. To evaluate the extent to which
electronic devices affect school percentage, a survey I put together asked a series of
relevant questions.
These questions facilitate a generalization about the effect that time spent on electronic
devices has on school percentage of the students of Suncity.
The survey in this research paper looks at the results of 140 participants, from grade 6 to 12,
in order to draw inferences on electronic devices (weekly) on school percentage

Statistical methods:
The purpose of this experiment was to see if there is a correlation between Time spent on
electronic devices and school percentage.
To collect data, I directed the class coordinators of each grade to pick 20 children at random
from the grade they represent (10 boys and 10 girls), which is Stratified sampling. By doing
so, a substantial amount of data was collected from a wide range of age groups, facilitating
higher representativeness. Having a wide range of age groups allows a generalization to be
made about correlation between time spent on electronic devices (weekly) and school
percentage.
The correspondents grades and answers to the questions on time spent on electronic
devices are the most important variables in the survey.
Discussion:

The correlation found reflects about how well kids who spend a certain amount of time on
electronic devices do academically.

They were asked the following questions:

1) What grade are you in?


2) What is your current age?
3) On average, how many hours do you spend on electronic devices, such as the
Television and your phone, weekly? (for entertainment purposes)
4) What was your percentage in the final exams that took place 2 months ago?
5) Do you feel as if you waste a lot of valuable study time by using electronic devices
for those many hours? (Yes/No)
6) Which electronic device do you spend majority of your time on?
a) Laptop
b) Phone
c) Television
d) Tablet
e) Gaming console
f) Other

We have 2 Hypothesis in this study:

1) Null hypothesis: There is a linear correlation between the hours spent on electronics
and school percentage of the students.
Alternate hypothesis: There is no linear correlation between the hours spent on
electronics and school percentage of the students.
2) Null hypothesis: There is a linear correlation between the hours spent on electronics
and age of the students. Alternate
hypothesis: There is no linear correlation between the hours spent on electronics
and age of the students.

Analysis:

Descriptive Data Analysis: A pie chart was used to see which devices are used in what
proportions. The pie chart clearly revealed that the majority of the respondents, 31.43%
used the phone the most, which isnt surprising considering the vast social circle that is
readily approachable on it.

We examine the following bar plot to see the number of students from each grade who feel
they use the electronic devices for longer than they should. It shows us that among student
of younger grades, there is less of a worry of as to how much time they are spending on
electronic devices, when compared to their elder counterparts.
The histogram below is the students answer to the question On average, how many hours
do you spend on electronic devices, such as the Television and your phone, weekly? (for
entertainment purposes) It shows a normal distribution pattern. Mean of 21.7, median of
22 which are not far off from each other, shows that the data is unimodal. There is no
apparent skew and no notable outliers.

The boxplot shows the outlier much clearer. There seems to be one mathematical outlier,
the individual who uses electronics 46 hours a week on average. This is believable as
someone who plays video games with a passion would put these many hours into playing
the game.
The first scatter plot is used to provide a pictorial relationship between hours of electronics
per week and the school percentage. As expected, there is a negative linear relationship
between the two, as someone who would use electronics less (for entertainment purposes)
would spend more of his time doing something more valuable, like educating
himself/herself. In this instance, I noted a negative correlation of -0.494 and several outliers,
like the student who got a 52% despite using electronics for only 15 hours a week and the
student who got a 91% even after using electronics for 34 hours a week.
The second scatterplot shows us a relationship between hours of electronics per week and
age of the student. A negative relationship is expected as higher grades such as 11th and 12th
would require more time to be devoted to studies and less to be used on electronics for the
purpose of entertainment. Here too, there is a negative correlation of -0.39 and notable
outliers, like the student that is only 11 years of age and uses electronics for gratification
only for 11 hours in a week on average.
Column n
Mean Variance Std. dev. Std. err. Median Rang Min Ma Q1 Q3
e x
Hours of Electronics 140 21.76 67.462 8.213 0.6941 22 40 6 46 15 27
per week
School Percentage 140 77.85 144.416 12.017 1.0156 79 52 45 97 71 87.
5
Age 140 14.02 4.078 2.0195 0.1706 14 8 10 18 12 16

Test analysis (Inferential):

Regression here was done to note the existence of correlation between school percentage
and hours spent on electronic devices each week. The correlation is -0.494 between the
school percentage and hours on electronics a week. Such a high negative correlation was no
surprise to me as someone who spends an excessive time on electronics wouldnt be able to
spare much to study and obtain a high percentage and visa versa. In this case the P value is
less than 0.001, so we fail to reject the true null hypothesis (that there is a linear
relationship between the 2 variables.

Simple linear regression results:


Dependent Variable: School Percentage
Independent Variable: Hours of Electronics per week
School Percentage = 93.590729 - 0.72323663 Hours of Electronics per week
Sample size: 140
R (correlation coefficient) = -0.49431315
R-sq = 0.24434549
Estimate of error standard deviation: 10.484252

Parameter estimates:
Parameter Estimate Std. Err. Alternative DF T-Stat P-value
Intercept 93.590729 2.5174693 0 138 37.176512 <0.0001
Slope -0.72323663 0.10826806 0 138 -6.6800554 <0.0001

Analysis of variance table for regression model:


Source DF SS MS F-stat P-value
Model 1 4904.9546 4904.9546 44.62314 <0.0001
Error 138 15168.895 109.91953
Total 139 20073.85
Similarly, here linear regression was done to identify the existence of correlation between
students ages and hours spent on electronic devices each week. The correlation is -0.390
between the age of the student and hours on electronics a week. Such a high negative
correlation is understandable as with a increase in age, school academics becomes far more
challenging and demand more time from students in order to do well. The P value is less
than 0.001, so we fail to reject the true null hypothesis (that there is a linear relationship
between the 2 variables). Hence age and hours spent on electronic devise have a linear
relationship.

Simple linear regression results:


Dependent Variable: Hours of Electronics per week
Independent Variable: Age
Hours of Electronics per week = 44.030288 - 1.5879981 Age
Sample size: 140
R (correlation coefficient) = -0.39046293
R-sq = 0.1524613
Estimate of error standard deviation: 7.5888735

Parameter estimates:
Parameter Estimate Std. Err. Alternative DF T-Stat P-value
Intercept 44.030288 4.5147113 0 138 9.7526254 <0.0001
Slope -1.5879981 0.3187208 0 138 -4.9824114 <0.0001

Analysis of variance table for regression model:


Source DF SS MS F-stat P-value
Model 1 1429.6634 1429.6634 24.824423 <0.0001
Error 138 7947.5581 57.591
Total 139 9377.2214

Conclusion:

The linear regression results obtained verified my initial belief that an hours on electronic
devices for entertainment are dependent on his age, and his age is dependent on the
number of hours individuals spend on electronics. Even though the results are in
accordance with my perception that the aforementioned variables are
negatively, there are various loopholes which could have led to these unexpected results.

In this survey and experiment, there are many lurking variables. The first one could be that
the students play outdoors or practice some sport or instrument in their spare time, thus
not allowing them to have time to study. Another could be that some need less time to
study because they have a higher IQ than most of the others. Another could be the parental
pressure enforced upon the child to not use electronics even though he may not be studying
in the meantime. These should be taken into account while analysing and interpreting the
data.

Source:

Do you
feel
like
waste Hours of
study Electronics School
Grade time? per week Percentage Age
6th No 21 74 11
6th No 14 84 11
6th No 10 92 12
6th No 23 84 11
6th yes 21 85 11
6th No 24 62 11
6th No 25 72 11
6th yes 33 89 10
6th No 14 90 11
6th no 40 53 11
6th no 34 73 11
6th no 24 70 11
6th yes 24 84 11
6th no 16 81 12
6th yes 36 68 11
6th no 35 62 11
6th no 22 88 12
6th no 36 72 11
6th no 11 90 11
6th no 16 96 11
7th yes 32 59 12
7th no 16 76 12
7th no 26 63 12
7th no 28 68 13
7th yes 33 60 13
7th no 27 79 12
7th no 14 89 12
7th yes 27 72 12
7th no 25 79 12
7th no 25 82 12
7th no 13 88 12
7th yes 32 81 12
7th no 17 72 12
7th no 31 48 12
7th no 26 83 12
7th yes 28 92 11
7th no 15 92 12
7th yes 27 82 12
7th no 22 67 12
7th no 30 84 12
8th yes 46 55 13
8th no 24 67 13
8th no 12 86 13
8th no 21 74 12
8th no 16 87 13
8th no 13 93 13
8th yes 34 71 12
8th yes 32 62 13
8th no 25 90 13
8th yes 22 75 13
8th no 31 62 13
8th yes 45 60 13
8th no 32 83 13
8th no 17 96 14
8th no 34 69 13
8th yes 23 70 13
8th no 19 89 13
8th no 15 85 13
8th no 19 92 13
8th yes 29 82 13
9th yes 34 91 13
9th no 20 73 14
9th no 34 62 14
9th no 27 66 14
9th yes 38 45 14
9th no 23 53 15
9th no 21 71 14
9th yes 19 97 14
9th yes 28 75 14
9th yes 27 73 15
9th no 27 90 14
9th no 15 85 14
9th no 18 87 14
9th yes 9 96 14
9th no 14 91 14
9th yes 13 97 14
9th no 24 85 14
9th no 12 88 14
9th yes 29 71 14
9th yes 26 78 14
10th no 12 90 15
10th no 16 72 15
10th yes 25 91 15
10th no 20 90 15
10th yes 29 81 14
10th yes 27 72 15
10th yes 33 90 16
10th yes 31 78 15
10th no 23 52 15
10th yes 21 62 15
10th no 15 94 14
10th yes 25 84 15
10th yes 26 79 15
10th no 12 95 15
10th no 15 83 16
10th yes 14 95 15
10th yes 16 72 15
10th no 26 74 15
10th no 24 79 15
10th yes 35 82 15
11th yes 30 64 16
11th yes 15 79 16
11th no 18 83 16
11th yes 27 71 16
11th no 12 75 16
11th no 15 85 16
11th no 15 90 16
11th yes 19 75 16
11th no 9 91 16
11th yes 25 85 16
11th yes 20 78 16
11th no 8 85 16
11th yes 24 73 16
11th yes 24 78 16
11th yes 13 62 17
11th no 11 66 15
11th yes 17 93 16
11th yes 15 52 16
11th no 16 74 16
11th yes 24 60 16
12th yes 12 91 17
12th yes 17 64 17
12th yes 25 53 17
12th yes 12 60 17
12th yes 11 72 17
12th no 6 95 17
12th no 15 84 17
12th yes 15 75 17
12th no 11 85 17
12th yes 18 83 17
12th yes 22 63 17
12th yes 9 87 17
12th yes 14 90 17
12th no 22 84 17
12th yes 14 76 16
12th no 7 87 18
12th yes 24 66 17
12th yes 16 85 17
12th yes 25 72 17
12th yes 10 86 17

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