The Degradation of Student Communication Ethics on Instagram and TikTok: A Case Study at Universitas Nusantara PGRI Kediri

Abstract

The rapid development of digital technology has fundamentally transformed students' communication patterns, particularly on social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok. Despite growing scholarly attention to digital communication, limited studies have examined ethics degradation specifically within Indonesian academic communities using sociological frameworks. This study addresses that gap by examining the phenomenon of communication ethics degradation among students of Nusantara PGRI University Kediri (UNP Kediri), focusing on interactions within the comment sections of these two platforms. Employing a descriptive qualitative approach, data were collected through non-participant observation and semi-structured interviews. The findings reveal that students frequently engage in personal attacks, destructive sarcasm, negative labeling, and digital polarization when confronted with differing opinions. Drawing on Durkheim's framework of organic solidarity and anomie, these behaviors reflect a crisis of moral regulation within the digital academic community, driven by individual factors such as limited self-regulation, institutional gaps in digital ethics education, and structural factors including the algorithmic architecture of social media platforms. This study contributes a sociological lens to understanding digital ethics degradation in higher education, concluding that such degradation is not merely a linguistic issue but a symptom of weakening organic solidarity that demands systematic educational intervention.