Fresh University Students and Phone Use Preferences: The Perception of a Public University in Ghana

The current study was a case study in one of the public universities in Ghana to ascertain phone acquisition and use tendencies of first year university students in their first semester of university education. A sample size of 300 was used for the study. The findings indicated that all the 300 (100%) students had phones whilst 223 (74.3%) of them had smartphones with internet functionality. It was found out that there was a significant difference between first year university students’ time spent on phones, based on age. Again, there was a significant negative correlation between first year university students’ time spent on phones based on their age. Further, the study revealed that first year university students were more likely to spend one semester (four months) on their phones in a four-year programme. The implications for practice have been discussed. Keywords: cell phones use, classroom, phone acquisition, time, first year students