Abstract
This research aimed to examine the influence of social media and value education on perceptions of security and insecurity among youth in Gombe metropolis. Three research questions and three hypotheses were set and the cross-sectional descriptive survey research design was employed. Participants comprised of 384 youth aged between 15 and 24 years comprising of 215 (56%) male, and 169 (44%) female was chosen through the purposive sampling technique. A questionnaire titled Social Media and Value Education Influence on Perceptions of Security among Youth Questionnaire (SMVEIPSAYQ) created on Google online platform was used for data collection. Data were descriptively (mean and standard deviation) and inferentially (t-tests, ANOVA, correlation analysis) analysed using the SPSS statistical software. The findings indicated the most used social media platforms as Facebook, WhatsApp, Tiktok, YouTube, Instagram, snapchat and telegram, the average daily time spent on social media as 3 hours, and that 65% of youth have received one form of training or the other on value education. The result further indicated that social media plays a significant role in shaping youth' perceptions of security and insecurity. Increased exposure to social media platforms was associated with heightened feelings of insecurity among respondents. The findings suggest that social media usage plays a role in shaping perceptions of security and insecurity among youth as the time spent on social media increases, so does the likelihood of feeling insecure, value education appears to have a mitigating effect on perceptions of insecurity, and gender differences exist in perceptions of security/insecurity by male and female youth in relation to social media and value education. Based on the results, it was recommended that youth should prioritize responsible social media use and digital literacy, while families, schools, and community stakeholders should emphasize comprehensive value education programmes integrating social and emotional learning components to provide youth with essential skills and values, fostering positive social norms and resilience in the digital age

Keywords
social media, value education, security, insecurity