The Saudi Center for Opinion Polling (SCOP): 75% of Saudi society believe that social media applications have positive effects on them :

The Saudi Center for Opinion Polling (SCOP) conducted a survey in February 2022 on the usage of social media applications by the Saudi community. The survey was conducted on a random sample of 1,220 citizens of both genders aged 18 and over.

The survey measured the degree of association with the applications by tracking which one comes to mind first when thinking about them. The results showed that the first thing that comes to mind is the “WhatsApp” application, which received the highest percentage of 33%, followed by the “Snapchat” application in second place with a slight difference of 30%, followed by the “Twitter” application by ten points with a percentage of 20%. The “Instagram” application came after them by a significant difference, with a percentage of 7% coming to mind.

As for the level of use of the applications, the results showed a different picture, where it was found that 92% of Saudis use the WhatsApp application, 79% use the YouTube application, 77% use the Snapchat application, 61% use the Twitter application, while the use of the Instagram and TikTok applications was 58% and 51%, respectively.

The surprising result is that 4% of those surveyed do not use any of the social media applications, which is a very low percentage.

It is interesting to note that males are more likely to use the Twitter and YouTube applications, while females are more likely to use the Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok applications. At the age variable level, the results showed that the elderly (45 years and older) are more likely to use WhatsApp, YouTube, and Twitter applications, while the youth group between 18-29 uses several applications more than others, such as Snapchat, TikTok, and Instagram.

As for the level of preference for applications, the results showed that WhatsApp came in first place with 32%, followed by Snapchat with 26%. Twitter came in third place, but by a large margin compared to WhatsApp and Snapchat, with 12% of those who prefer Twitter, and less than that for the other applications: YouTube, which is preferred by 9%, TikTok with 8%, Instagram with 7%, and Telegram with 1%.

In the context of preference, it was found that the YouTube and WhatsApp applications are the favorites of males, while females prefer Instagram and Snapchat. At the age variable level, it is observed that the elderly (45 years and older) prefer the WhatsApp application, while the youth group between 18-29 prefers TikTok and Snapchat.

It seems that the community believes a lot in these applications and the usefulness of using them, as 75% believe that the applications have positive impacts on them, the most important of which is that the applications have made it easy for them to communicate with others and helped them in self-learning. They also see them as a quick way to access information and exchange it.

This optimistic view of use comes in the context of the awareness of 48% of the community that these applications have negative effects, the most important of which is wasting time, causing health problems such as obesity and poor vision, in addition to isolation from society, spreading false information, and causing weakness in family relationships.

It is worth noting that the Saudi Center for Opinion Polling is a non-profit organization licensed by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development and the Ministry of Commerce. It is interested in conducting opinion polls to understand the most important issues that affect the community. Its surveys consider the representation of males and females in the ratio documented by the General Statistics Authority.