Digital Engagement and Mental Well-Being of the Students in a Barangay in Gapan City, Nueva Ecija

Abstract

Previous research and rigorous studies have told that digital engagement inversely affects the mental well-being of individuals. However, there are those who also assumed that digital engagement can enhance one’s mental capability, particularly the students who are in remote learning and can allot ample if not excessive time on technological devices. In lieu of this, the study sought to investigate the phenomenon of digital engagement and mental well-being of young people. Using a survey research with the senior high school students from a barangay in Gapan, Nueva Ecija, the study sought to answer the following specific questions: how do teenagers engage with regular digital activities?; what is the measurement of digital engagement of the teenagers?; does digital engagement has impact on the mental well-being of teenagers?; and last, how can positive digital engagement be communicated to teenagers? Also, this paper implored the implications of digital engagement and mental health of the students in terms of cognitive, emotional, and behavioral aspects. The statistical tools utilized were the weighted mean and standard deviation. This was done after the students watched a digital activity using a Youtube video on climate change. Results showed that a weighted mean with the verbal interpretation of “agree” became the outcome, and the values were not so deviated from the mean, as the SD tabulated was less than 1. Finally, a summary of findings concluded that, despite the comparison with historical research, digital engagement has a high degree of significance with mental health of the students, positively, in terms of cognitive, behavioral, and emotional health. Meanwhile, most of the students are engaged in social media, rather than education and personal development. Consequently, at the end of this research, a communication program was recommended to remedy the said reliance of the students on digital engagement. Other recommendations included the usage of more academic strands other than STEM, utilization of other statistical treatments to measure the percentage of error, and lastly, intervention of other programs such as sports, music, and arts, in helping the students with their mental health problems as caused by too much digital engagement.