ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Educational Psychology
WeChat Dual-Group (Mis-)Use: A Qualitative Exploration of Chinese Undergraduate Students' Use of Mobile Social Media Applications and Its Pedagogical Implications
Provisionally accepted
- Chengdu University of Technology, Chengdu, China
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Social media applications are increasingly embedded in higher education, reshaping students' communication and collaboration. In China, the platform WeChat serves both as a formal instructional tool and an informal peer network in organising teaching and learning activities. This study investigates how undergraduate students in English translation programmes at a Chinese public university use WeChat group chats to support and undermine collaborative learning. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with 28 student informants and qualitative thematic analysis, it identifies a dual-group use of WeChat comprising instructor-inclusive and student-only groups. This arrangement enables students to separate formal, authoritative exchanges from informal, peer-driven interactions, balancing accuracy, timely feedback, and resource sharing with social support and autonomy, while it can also lead to information overload, fragmented communication, unequal participation, and risks of academic misconduct. By revealing the dynamics of dual-group use, this paper discusses practical pedagogical guidance for managing social media-based learning, programme development and discipline construction.
Keywords: Collaborative Learning, English translation education, second language learning, Discipline construction, Social media applications, programme development
Received: 15 Aug 2025; Accepted: 28 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Tan and Ren. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Ran Ren
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