PATTERNS AND PURPOSES OF SOCIAL MEDIA USAGE AMONG INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS IN XIAN: A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY

Social media has become an important part of international students everyday lives, especially in cross-cultural educational settings where it supports communication, information seeking, and social connection. However, less attention has been paid to platform preferences and reported purposes of social media usage in localized Chinese contexts such as Xi’an. This study adopted a quantitative cross-sectional survey design and collected data through a structured questionnaire from a surveyed sample of international students in Xian, China. After data screening, 381 valid responses were retained for analysis. Descriptive statistics were conducted using IBM SPSS Statistics, including frequencies and percentages for platform selections, means and standard deviations for ten reported social media usage-purpose items, and a Friedman test to assess differences across item ratings. The results showed that WeChat and Douyin were the most frequently selected platforms in the questionnaire item. Relatively higher-rated reported purposes included learning about Xi’an’s culture and history, finding friends with similar experiences, obtaining local information, and sharing experiences to receive feedback. The Friedman test indicated statistically significant differences across the ten usage-purpose items; however, the effect size was very small, suggesting that these differences should be interpreted cautiously. Overall, the findings suggest that, within this sample, social media was reported as a practical and relational resource for local orientation, peer connection, and everyday adaptation in Xi’an.